Sunak has used a lot of Political Credit on sorting out the Northern Ireland Protocol deal ...

You said you had not drawn any drawbridge- so I replied that you did.

'I voted Leave for OUR country, it's laws and sovereignty'

not working very well, is it!!!

Those who had worked very hard at renovating a house to go and retire to in EU were 'traitors' then, as far as you are concerned!? You do realise those people have worked hard in the UK all their lives, often doing essential jobs, paying taxes, and contributing in so many ways. Many are still paying taxes in the UK.

Fact is, when they decided to buy old properties and spent so much time, effort and savings, planning for their future retirement- they had no idea this would happen and their lives made so so much more difficult.

Off topic, but thank you Siope. Lots of obstacles, but hopefully happy endings!

So how well do you think your vote has worked out for the UK Ug?

But you did- for those who intended to go and live there, especially on retirement.

Goodness Fleurpepper why on EARTH would I, when casting my vote in the referendum as a UK resident and intending to spend MY retirement living and paying taxes in the UK, give a stuff about retirees who intended to bail from OUR country to live in France?? It wouldn’t make sense! I voted Leave for OUR country, it’s laws and sovereignty. Those who intended to upsticks would not be of concern to me as I cast my vote. They would be intending to be French residents. ‘Vive la France!’ Bon chance. But not my circus. Sorry. I voted the way I did for the future of OUR country. The UK. Not for future residents of the Dordogne or

Joseanne, typed a long reply and it’s vanished!
Essentially, there are new costs for things like visas and visa renewal, getting proofs of income and other documents translated and notarised, extra health insurance requirements.
I was legal, it doesn’t help me get back, but will make life a bit simpler when I’m there (registering for healthcare, for example). My husband, though, wasn’t there before, so starting from scratch.

Also, visa restrictions mean limitations on other travel we had planned, which is a pain in the proverbial. It is so different (worse) to the days when we could just come and go.

And, of course, young people, who can’t get a non-lucrative/retirement visa will find it much more difficult.

DaisyAnne

Back to the OP. Having had time to think about it, it's still well done to Sunak for rescuing his party from one of their self-made messes but I can't see him getting much further.

You are quite right DaisyAnne we have diverted the thread. It won’t be long before these discussions turn into a proverbial bunfight! He said, she said, they did etc.

On GBnews earlier Farage has pages of the newly agreed deal with the EU. Seems he and the DUP are astonished how little of what has been agreed upon is in fact noteworthy. Apparently the UK interpretation of the new Agreement is very much at odds to how Brussels sees things (including the Stormont Break).

Maybe ‘dear Rishi’ has been kippered and diced by Ursula’s team?

Further exploration of the details are being pored over. Sadly, just maybe, the initial hype and euphoria is somewhat displaced.

That said I think most of the voting public are sick to the back teeth of hearing the words ‘Northern Ireland Protocol’ so maybe apathy will win the day, regardless?

Siope

GrannyGravy13, I’m in the process of moving to a country I once moved to pre-Brexit, and I can assure you it’s now much more expensive and complicated, with terms and conditions - such as minimum income guarantees, time spent in country to count towards residence permits and visa renewals, and more - that didn’t apply pre-Brexit.

I'm not surprised everything is more expensive now, that's life. Can I ask did you work in that country and were you in the system? We are considering retiring, (not yet of age), back to a European country we resided in pre Brexit, and so far are finding that country very accommodating IF you were in the tax & health system.

GrannyGravy13

Fleurpepper

Urmstongran

I didn’t pull up any drawbridge. Thank you GG13.
A friend of ours bought a small apartment up the road from us in October last year. Easy peasy” was how she described it! They, like us, are not wealthy.

Anyway didn’t most voters decide what they wanted out of the referendum on personal circumstances? Actually the majority I would hazard!

But you did- for those who intended to go and live there, especially on retirement. We have many friends who spent all their savings buying a doer-upper in France, Italy or Spain, and spent all their holidays working hard on renovation, garden, etc. - and again, all their savings along the way. With the intention of moving there when they retired. They can't do that now- and couldn't afford to retire early to beat the deadline.

Not only are their dreams shattered, they can't sell at a decent price to get their money back, as so many are in the same situation. They have to keep a property in the UK too- when they intended to sell to have money to live on.

It is not impossible to retire to France.

Friends bought and moved to France last year, from seeing the property, sale going through and them receiving their year long temporary residence took four months.

They are now halfway through process of applying for permanent residence.

It is mot impossible, just a few more bits of paperwork.

I have lived here for 17 years and nothing in France is just a few bits of paperwork. 😂😂😂

GrannyGravy13, I’m in the process of moving to a country I once moved to pre-Brexit, and I can assure you it’s now much more expensive and complicated, with terms and conditions - such as minimum income guarantees, time spent in country to count towards residence permits and visa renewals, and more - that didn’t apply pre-Brexit.

Back to the OP. Having had time to think about it, it's still well done to Sunak for rescuing his party from one of their self-made messes but I can't see him getting much further.

Fleurpepper

Possible, but not guaranteed, and very complicated and stressful.

Not what they are saying.

Possible, but not guaranteed, and very complicated and stressful.

Fleurpepper

Urmstongran

I didn’t pull up any drawbridge. Thank you GG13.
A friend of ours bought a small apartment up the road from us in October last year. Easy peasy” was how she described it! They, like us, are not wealthy.

Anyway didn’t most voters decide what they wanted out of the referendum on personal circumstances? Actually the majority I would hazard!

But you did- for those who intended to go and live there, especially on retirement. We have many friends who spent all their savings buying a doer-upper in France, Italy or Spain, and spent all their holidays working hard on renovation, garden, etc. - and again, all their savings along the way. With the intention of moving there when they retired. They can't do that now- and couldn't afford to retire early to beat the deadline.

Not only are their dreams shattered, they can't sell at a decent price to get their money back, as so many are in the same situation. They have to keep a property in the UK too- when they intended to sell to have money to live on.

It is not impossible to retire to France.

Friends bought and moved to France last year, from seeing the property, sale going through and them receiving their year long temporary residence took four months.

They are now halfway through process of applying for permanent residence.

It is mot impossible, just a few more bits of paperwork.

Urmstongran

I didn’t pull up any drawbridge. Thank you GG13.
A friend of ours bought a small apartment up the road from us in October last year. Easy peasy” was how she described it! They, like us, are not wealthy.

Anyway didn’t most voters decide what they wanted out of the referendum on personal circumstances? Actually the majority I would hazard!

But you did- for those who intended to go and live there, especially on retirement. We have many friends who spent all their savings buying a doer-upper in France, Italy or Spain, and spent all their holidays working hard on renovation, garden, etc. - and again, all their savings along the way. With the intention of moving there when they retired. They can't do that now- and couldn't afford to retire early to beat the deadline.

Not only are their dreams shattered, they can't sell at a decent price to get their money back, as so many are in the same situation. They have to keep a property in the UK too- when they intended to sell to have money to live on.

Thank you Riverwalk I get what you’re saying now. 😁
Good job Spain let me buy a property .... hehe! Mind you we paid dearly in 2004 it was just before the big recession hit so we paid top dollar (or euro!). Fortunately after the recession when the market value of our placed plummeted by half, it has very very slowly crept back up in priceto what we originally paid for it! If we’d have bought a caravan in say, Wales, 19y ago - that money would be long gone by now. So in that respect we feel we made a good choice.
😊

Urmston my bear brain is even smaller!

What I'm trying to say is, when we were in the EU we had an automatic right to buy property, study, work, etc., now we can still do these things but don't have an automatic right to do so.

So you can buy a property but different rules could apply - just as in say Turkey where a friend bought many years ago, it was very easy to purchase but she had no legal right to buy as a non national, but was allowed to.

It's by the grace of any EU country to allow us to do anything, whereas before we had a right.

Tbh it just seems like semantics.

Sorry to be dim here Riverwalk but what have I had access to that my friend who bought recently doesn’t? I truly don’t get it.

... in the future they won't be able to do so on the equal terms that you did

Can you be specific to help a bear of very little brain as I truly don’t think I had any more advantageous terms when we bought?

Urmston my point was along the lines of, if your AC or GC want to buy in the EU in the future they won't be able to do so on the equal terms that you did, not that it won't be technically easy just not on the same terms.

You had a right to do, future purchasers don't.

Just as UK students can still study in the EU, but they don't have an absolute right to do so. if you get my drift.

How easy peasy the technicalities are is not the same as a legal right.

www.myspanishresidency.com/buying-house-spain/

Doesn’t seem much different now than when we bought to be honest.

I didn’t pull up any drawbridge. Thank you GG13.
A friend of ours bought a small apartment up the road from us in October last year. Easy peasy” was how she described it! They, like us, are not wealthy.

Anyway didn’t most voters decide what they wanted out of the referendum on personal circumstances? Actually the majority I would hazard!

GrannyGravy13

Riverwalk

Urmstongran

MaizieD

Lots of people who owned places in Spain voted Leave, GSM. They didn't think it would make any difference to them.

I think the 'Spain really needs the British tourists' belief had much the same potency as 'German car makers will make sure the British get a good deal'

We did and it hasn’t.

It might not make any difference to you but it does for anyone else who might want to buy a flat in Spain with the ease which you no doubt did.

You helped pull up the drawbridge to fellow Britons who might want to buy a place in the EU sun - obviously it wouldn't be so straightforward now, at least for those of modest means, rather than the jet-set who can buy their way into anywhere.

No it hasn’t pulled up the drawbridge our close friends purchased a new build second home in Spain last summer.

It was straight forward, the key to buying abroad is to have a good bi-lingual legal representative.

Obviously you can still buy in the EU - I have a friend currently buying in Italy - my point was it wouldn't be from the same starting point. Regardless of your lawyer, you no longer have the same rights as you did as an EU citizen.

Riverwalk

Urmstongran

MaizieD

Lots of people who owned places in Spain voted Leave, GSM. They didn't think it would make any difference to them.

I think the 'Spain really needs the British tourists' belief had much the same potency as 'German car makers will make sure the British get a good deal'

We did and it hasn’t.

It might not make any difference to you but it does for anyone else who might want to buy a flat in Spain with the ease which you no doubt did.

You helped pull up the drawbridge to fellow Britons who might want to buy a place in the EU sun - obviously it wouldn't be so straightforward now, at least for those of modest means, rather than the jet-set who can buy their way into anywhere.

No it hasn’t pulled up the drawbridge our close friends purchased a new build second home in Spain last summer.

It was straight forward, the key to buying abroad is to have a good bi-lingual legal representative.

Urmstongran

MaizieD

Lots of people who owned places in Spain voted Leave, GSM. They didn't think it would make any difference to them.

I think the 'Spain really needs the British tourists' belief had much the same potency as 'German car makers will make sure the British get a good deal'

We did and it hasn’t.

It might not make any difference to you but it does for anyone else who might want to buy a flat in Spain with the ease which you no doubt did.

You helped pull up the drawbridge to fellow Britons who might want to buy a place in the EU sun - obviously it wouldn't be so straightforward now, at least for those of modest means, rather than the jet-set who can buy their way into anywhere.

It defeats me to understand how such tighter restrictions are a benefit. Closing the door to others opportunities just because they don’t apply to you seems a tad selfish to me.