Prisoners and members of the Roma community, along with elderly people and the poorest in society, will be the focus of a new EU push to help Europeans “outside the mainstream” to remain in the UK after Brexit.
There are concerns that thousands of EU nationals will fail to apply to the Home Office to stay because they lack information or the means to see the digital application process through.
The new EU ambassador to the UK, João Vale de Almeida, said Brussels and the embassies of the bloc’s 27 member states in London needed to step up efforts to reach those on the fringes of British society.
This is Europe is a new stream of Guardian journalism that investigates the big challenges that transcend national boundaries, and seeks out the solutions that could benefit us all. These are testing times, and crises are not limited by national borders. But then neither are we.
EU nationals need to apply before 31 June 2021 to remain in the UK but there is uncertainty about the number of citizens affected and the level of success in information getting through to the most cut-off groups.
Vale de Almeida said a special focus was on “everyone that is for some reason outside the mainstream for socioeconomic [reasons] or age or ethnic or otherwise”. He added: “Roma people is a big issue as well for some countries.”
The embassy said EU officials have held talks with the Home Office on how those in UK prisons or in pre-trial detention could be advised of their rights.
A monitoring network of 50 NGOs has been established by the EU embassy in London, which is also looking into the issue, with bimonthly meetings held to map the wider situation.
Vale de Almeida, the first ever EU ambassador to the UK, said: “It is possible that at the end of this period or close to the end of the period we’ll have to reassess where we are, and what are the main issues that will have to be answered to avoid too many people being left out.
“And then there’s the issue of how the UK is going to treat those who for some reason, are outside of the deadline and could not make it in time,” he added in an interview to mark the launch of a new Guardian series on Europe. “And that we will have, in dialogue with UK authorities, to see how we can deal with all those problems. That’s why I’m saying in the year and so left we have to step up our efforts.”
The Tory minister Brandon Lewis, when he was security minister, had suggested that those who failed to meet the deadline would face deportation.
The Home Office has since clarified that it will be generous towards those who miss the cut-off through no fault of their own.
There is no automatic bar on EU nationals with criminal records being allowed to stay but a prison sentence wipes out years of accumulated residence.
Settled status, under which EU nationals retain similar rights to today, requires five years living in the UK. Those seeking pre-settled status must show they have been resident for some period before the end of 2020.
There are 4,000 EU nationals in British prisons. The charity Unlock, which works for the rights of people with criminal convictions, estimates about 500,000 EU nationals have criminal records, in line with the proportion of the UK population.
Vale de Almeida said he did not believe EU nationals needed to be alarmed by the recent deportation of 17 Jamaicans with convictions, many of whom had lived in the UK for decades.
“I have no reasons to make any pre-judgment on any behaviour,” he said. “For the time being, we’re working well with with our British [partners]. I think we need to be very attentive and try to identify cases where things are not working well.”
Vale de Almeida said an obstacle was the lack of firm figures on how many EU nationals are in the UK, with the latest estimates as high as 3.8 million. “I don’t think any of us would want, you know, hundreds of thousands of citizens to be left behind,” he said.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We are working with vulnerable group representatives, local authorities and other experts to ensure the right support is in place for vulnerable and ‘at risk’ citizens, be it online, over the phone, or in person.
“The EU settlement scheme is as straightforward as possible and we have granted nearly 2.9 million status with over a year to go.”