An Italian restaurant owner and his British wife have had their bank accounts frozen overnight after 15 years of custom in a “catastrophic” post-Brexit tactic they say is designed by the government to frighten immigrants into leaving the UK. Massimo and Dee are two of thousands of EU citizens who are discovering the permanent residence (PR) cards they obtained were invalidated by Brexit and even after 21 years of paying tax in the UK it does not entitle them to remain. Representatives at the EU citizens campaign group the3million fear there is worse to come after the “shameful” decision by the government to make it more difficult for people such as Massimo to get the EU settled status they need in place of the blue PR card. The3million said it had seen multiple cases of people with permanent residency cards being rejected summarily under this new rule.
Andreea Dumitrache, the interim chief executive of the campaign group, said: “From August, not knowing you have to apply to the settlement scheme even though you were granted a document confirming your residency rights previously is no longer considered a reasonable ground for applying late.” She said it was shameful as EU citizens living in the UK before Brexit were guaranteed their residency rights under the legally binding EU-UK withdrawal agreement. “Many people still don’t know they had to apply to the EU settlement scheme, as proved by the over 4,000 successful grants of status a month awarded to late applicants before the catastrophic scheme changes brought in August,” she said. The first time Dee and Massimo, who did not want their surname used, knew about their immigration peril was when a supplier phoned them to say a bill had not been paid. They had just moved to Belfast from Kent to open a restaurant and decided to close their English business account with Santander and open a new one with the Northern Ireland address for convenience. Yet within weeks they were locked out of the new account and Massimo out of his personal account. Dee said: “We had to close the doors to our business as a result because we couldn’t pay suppliers and we had just started the restaurant. We were growing the business and no one in Santander was prepared to discuss this with us.” When they discovered Massimo should have applied for settled status, it was a body blow. He said: “I would never have thought something like this would happen. I’m quite a strong person but inside I’m very emotional because it’s like I’ve been rejected from a country where I’ve been for 20-odd years and I’ve done nothing wrong and they just say one day ‘bye, bye’, no explanation, nothing. It’s been horrible. “I am thinking how many people in this country are like me, not welcome in this country any more.”
In an effort to unlock business-critical funds they decided to remove Massimo as a director of the business in the official register at the UK’s Companies House. After inquiries were made by the Guardian a few weeks later, the bank account was unfrozen but his personal account remains out of reach. The bank refused to discuss details. A Santander spokesperson said: “We are investigating Mr [redacted]’s complaint.” However, immigration lawyers warned after Brexit that the “hostile environment” policy introduced by the former prime minister Theresa May would apply to EU citizens, many of whom had been in the UK for decades, some retired, some in care. Under the policy, the Home Office in effect outsources immigration enforcement, with financial penalties for employers, landlords and banks who do not check people’s immigration status. Dee said: “There are probably lots more people in this situation and it is scary. This is how people get homeless, that is the most horrible thing about it: one minute your bank account is open and you are living your life and the next minute … That is why we want to share our story. The sickening and disgusting thing about it is it’s all down to bureaucracy and bad law.” Under the EU-UK withdrawal agreement, the UK must guarantee the rights of EU citizens living legally in the country before Brexit while EU countries must do the same for British citizens living in the bloc. The scheme was closed in June 2021 but the government promised to take late applications if there were “reasonable grounds”. But in August they changed the rules so lack of awareness of the EU settlement scheme is no longer a justification. The3million has called on the government to urgently abandon the new rule on late applications, arguing it is against the spirit if not the substance of the Brexit withdrawal agreement. It says the Home Office is cutting corners, rejecting applications on the basis of a lack of “reasonable grounds” for missing a deadline, and giving people no right to appeal. This removes safeguards put in place for EU citizens to access their rights. Dumitrache said it was another example of an authoritarian policy that punishes people, removing their rights unfairly, owing to a fixation with a comparatively small number of “speculative” applications, which the Home Office has the capacity to manage. The Home Office said: “Permanent residence documents issued under the EEA Regulations confirmed a person’s status in the UK under EU free movement rules. We have long been clear that such documentation ceased to be valid at the end of the grace period on 30 June 2021. “More than two years have passed since the deadline for applying to the scheme, which was widely publicised. In line with our Citizens’ Rights Agreements commitments, we continue to accept and consider late applications from those with reasonable grounds for their delay in applying.”