The old medina in Tangier. Some vanlifers take a ferry to Morocco as part of their Schengen shuffling (Photo: Getty)
Emma Henke, who’s a fine artist, says of the travel rules: “It created a whole lot of drama for us that’s ongoing, despite the fact we are now married.”
In Germany, she has the Aufenthaltsrecht, or right to remain, in her husband’s town (these permissions are granted by the region), but her business is in the UK.
Dieter, meanwhile, has settled status in the UK and a business based in the Netherlands.
“Soon we will have to decide to be in one country and make some sacrifices,” Emma says. She adds that her personal situation has caused a “deep rift” with her Brexit-voting family members.
Some couples, such as Henke and her husband, rely on the expertise of experienced Schengen shufflers. British solicitor and keen campervanner Rupert Dillow has shared his knowledge of navigating the zones’ border rules in an e-book.
“There are EU countries that are within the Schengen Area, to which the 90-day visa waiver rule applies,” he says.
“There are countries not in the EU that are in Schengen, such as Iceland, Norway and Switzerland, and there are countries in the EU that are outside of Schengen.
“In these countries, including Cyprus, some travellers, including UK passport holders, have a visa-free travel allowance which will not count towards the 90 day Schengen allowance.”
If you start a relationship with someone in the Schengen Area, he says, “you really need to be aware of the risk of being deported if you overstay”.
Dillow adds that different countries will penalise overstayers with different degrees of severity.
“In stricter countries, such as France and Germany, you risk a ban from the whole Schengen Zone [if you break the rules].”
Cara, a 35-year-old musician from Brighton, who only wants to be known by her first name, is struggling to maintain a relationship with a journalist from Stockholm who she met at a gig in 2022.
Erik is aged 41 and has three young children who he co-parents with his Swedish ex-partner.
“Of course, Erik is tied to school terms in Sweden,” Cara says. “I also need to reserve my Schengen allocation for my work across Europe. It’s a real struggle. There are lots of lonely times when we can’t be together.”
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Family lawyer Jennifer McNeil has seen the complexities of Brexit lead to relationship breakdowns for couples who live between the UK and the EU (or Schengen Area).
“Brexit has made everything much more complicated,” McNeil says.
“There’s more ‘divorce shopping’, in which parties apply to a court for a case to be seized [taken up] in a country where the laws are favourable to them, and frequent clashes between financial considerations, habitual residences and where divorcing parties want to live [especially when children are involved].”
In the face of cold legal realities, McNeil advises international couples to take an annual stock of what they would each want to do in the event of a split.
“Like you would have a will to prepare for your death, couples should have an agreement to split,” she says. Crucially, she adds, this should be discussed while you are still on good relations.
Cara is now debating whether to propose to her Swedish other half. Meanwhile, like me, Emma Henke looks back wistfully on the simpler days of her youth.
“I graduated in 1996 and Europe was my playground,” she says. “I lived in Paris for a year, and I had a blast.”
Who would have thought, she muses, that two decades later she would be calculating Schengen calendar logistics with her other half.
“It rather sucks the romance out of a European romance, doesn’t it?”
Source link : https://inews.co.uk/inews-lifestyle/travel/partners-live-eu-brexit-rules-ruin-romance-uk-3080964
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Publish date : 2024-05-30 12:12:00
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