The Committee on Constitutional Affairs (AFCO) exchange views on the state of play of the negotiations on Brexit with Guy VERHOFSTADT, Parliament's coordinator for the negotiations on the UK withdrawal from the EU and Danuta Maria HÜBNER (EPP, PL), member of the Parliament's Brexit Steering Group, in the European Parliament in Strasbourg.

exchange of views

VERHOFSTADT, Guy (Renew, BE)

Brexit (T)

article 50 of the Lisbon treaty (T)

Strasbourg

meeting

HÜBNER, Danuta Maria (EPP, PL)

Exchange of views on the state of play of the negotiations on Brexit: extracts from the meeting with Guy VERHOFSTADT and Danuta Maria HÜBNER

SOUNDBITE (English), Guy VERHOFSTADT, EP coordinator for the negotiations with the UK (MEP), We can say today that 90 percent of the agreement that is necessary for the withdrawal has been agreed.

SOUNDBITE (English), Guy VERHOFSTADT, EP coordinator for the negotiations with the UK (MEP), <p>The question is that we want to be 100 percent sure that the scheme for EU citizens in the UK will indeed be user friendly, with the necessary assistance to those citizens who are vulnerable citizens and who could face practical problems by asking for this status.</p>

SOUNDBITE (English), Guy VERHOFSTADT, EP coordinator for the negotiations with the UK (MEP), We remain also unhappy that EU citizens that are resident in the UK and were resident in the UK before the notification of Article 50, that day will be charged with a fee for applying for said status. We think that is not serious. These people were resident in the UK. It's not their fault, it's not their choice that there is a Brexit, so we don't see how it is justified that these EU citizens resident in the UK before the notification of Article 50 should be charged with a fee for applying the settled status.

SOUNDBITE (English), Guy VERHOFSTADT, EP coordinator for the negotiations with the UK (MEP), We are very much in favour of what we call onward movement and residence for the UK citizens. That means that once they have a residence permit in one country or the possibility to reside there, that it is also applicable on all other Member States of the European Union and we think that the tradeoff for this could be that once that an EU citizen has received the settled status in Britain, that he keeps that right for his entire life. So when he goes for example a number of years, more than five years, even out of the UK, when he returns to the UK, that this settled status is still applicable.

SOUNDBITE (English), Guy VERHOFSTADT, EP coordinator for the negotiations with the UK (MEP), We have received confirmation by the UK government that the European Commission will be able to perform the role of the IMA (Independent Monetary Authority) during the transition period; something that was foreseen, also that is foreseen, in the draft of the withdrawal agreement.

SOUNDBITE (English), Richard CORBETT (S&amp;D, UK), In terms of the rights of UK citizens in other EU countries, as soon as the UK becomes a third country does that not become a matter of national competence rather than EU competence? The residential rights of citizens in the European Union, if they're not from another EU member state, is a national matter.

SOUNDBITE (English), Guy VERHOFSTADT, EP coordinator for the negotiations with the UK (MEP), My feeling was, in the last meeting I got in Downing Street then with Mrs May and with her staff, that such a tradeoff is possible and we are pushing for that, not only towards our British counterparts in Downing Street then, but also toward our own 27 Member States. That is a reason why the Brexit Steering Group a few weeks ago, I have not the date in mind for the moment, has organised a common meeting with the chairman of the Brexit Working Group; and the Brexit Working Group, as everybody knows now, is the working group of the 27 Member States, who is defining the position of the 27 in these negotiations and also preparing this position.