Hi

For the last 10 years I daily consider the reality of ABS2010 tag line.

Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope is for tomorrow else what is left if you remove a mans hope.

The thing about ECRIS is that you can't access it unless you agree to the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice, and this government keeps saying that they won't do that for anything. So, that sounds like they're giving up access to ECRIS. ECRIS isn't a database, it's a system of access to the criminal records systems of EU countries. Once we're out of the EU, it won't apply to the UK and they won't have automatic access to everyone's criminal record. Michael Gove got up on his hind legs in the House of Commons and said there are far more means of access and co-operation outside the EU, but a former Home Secretary, Theresa May, was unconvinced. Given how many years she was Home Secretary, I think she knows more about it than he does, but then I suppose Michael Gove thinks we've heard enough from experts....

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If you are to punish a man retributively you must injure him. If you are to reform him you must improve him. And men are not improved by injuries. (George Bernard Shaw)

I am in exactly the same position with an 18 month suspended sentence and on the SOR for 10 years (expiring 2025) for a downloading offence.

The lack of clarity is becoming a major concern as may be banned from visiting places I have been visiting regularly in the past without problem!

But how are 'serious' offences defined. In the official ETIAS proposal, they list the following

'serious criminal offences' means the offences which correspond or are equivalent to those referred to in Article 2(2) of Framework Decision 2002/584/JHA, if they are punishable under national law by a custodial sentence or a detention order for a maximum period of at least three years.

— participation in a criminal organisation,
— terrorism,
— trafficking in human beings,
— sexual exploitation of children and child pornography,
— illicit trafficking in narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances,
— illicit trafficking in weapons, munitions and explosives,
— corruption,
— fraud, including that affecting the financial interests of the European Communities within the meaning of the Convention of 26 July 1995 on the protection of the European Communities' financial interests,
— laundering of the proceeds of crime,
— counterfeiting currency, including of the euro,
— computer-related crime,
— environmental crime, including illicit trafficking in endangered animal species and in endangered plant species and varieties,
— facilitation of unauthorised entry and residence,
— murder, grievous bodily injury,
— illicit trade in human organs and tissue,
— kidnapping, illegal restraint and hostage-taking,
— racism and xenophobia,
— organised or armed robbery,
— illicit trafficking in cultural goods, including antiques and works of art,
— swindling,
— racketeering and extortion,
— counterfeiting and piracy of products,
— forgery of administrative documents and trafficking therein,
— forgery of means of payment,
— illicit trafficking in hormonal substances and other growth promoters,
— illicit trafficking in nuclear or radioactive materials,
— trafficking in stolen vehicles,
— rape,
— arson,
— crimes within the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court,
— unlawful seizure of aircraft/ships,
— sabotage.

3. The Council may decide at any time, acting unanimously after consultation of the European Parliament under the conditions laid down in Article 39(1) of the Treaty on European Union (TEU), to add other categories of offence to the list contained in paragraph 2. The Council shall examine, in the light of the report submitted by the Commission pursuant to Article 34(3), whether the list should be extended or amended.

So in terms of types of offences it is a wide range, but the key threshold is a sentence of 3 years or more.

Firstly, what the UK home office and UK media don't mention is that the current UK system for non-EU visas (which s the one Priti Patel wants to apply to EU after the Brexit transition period), has a 10 year rehabilitation period for anyone with a custodial sentence between 12 months and 4 years. If the EU were to reciprocate on a like-for-like basis, at least that provides a glimmer of hope for another segment of ex-offenders.

Secondly, my personal opinion is that the EU are unlikely to amend ETIAS rules just for one country i.e. UK.  At least the EU focuses on the types of crime (ETIAS has a list of 'serious offences') and not simply the sentence, so if the UK ends up under that regime, again the majority of ex-offenders will be OK.

Guys sadly there is to much conflicting information out there, and not even the governments of the UK or the EU know what is going on or what is going to happy, we will just have to sit and wait, as sad as it sounds, it is pointless losing sleepless nights until we see the full legislation of the new laws from both sides of the channel and how it might affect us all. we all just need to keep calm and carry on till we really know what is going to happen. 



  

There are a number of things that are unclear about ETIAS. It's not supposed to be fully operational until the end of 2022, which leaves a gap from 1st Jan 2021, when the UK leaves the EU. So what happens during this period?

ETIAS is very strongly linked to ECRIS, the European database of criminal records. The UK currently passes info to ECRIS, so will that continue after December? If the UK refuses to pass info to ECRIS, because of the the ECJ being involved, then presumably ECRIS will stop passing details of their criminals to us, which would make it impossible for Priti Patel to enforce her '1 year in jail and you're barred' policy.

So I would assume that we will agree to continue to share info and then ECRIS will change things, in that all applications via ETIAS will eventually be checked against ECRIS for a criminal record. This doesn't happen at the moment, which is why people from the UK can travel to Europe without the immigration people knowing what offence they have committed or what sentence they received. All the immigration are told currently is that the person is known to UK police, but not why they are known. ECRIS will change that.

The question then becomes what offences will lead to refusal and what will be allowed. If you read some of the ETIAS websites, they suggest that any offence that attracted a 3 year prison sentence, or higher, will probably be refused, but that it would be 2 years, if the offence was people traffiking or drug dealing. They also don't rule out the possibility that individual countries might have different rules.

There doesn't seem to be any clarity around spent convictions and whether these will have to be declared or not. ETIAS will ask about any convictions in the last 10 years, so it's possible that a UK citizen, with a spent conviction, might still have to declare it.

Unlike travelling to the USA, where you can lie about not having convictions, because the USA and the EU/UK don't share details of their criminal records, it won't be possible to lie to ETIAS, because the UK does share those details with the EU, through ECRIS.

I can't see the EU responding with the same rules. The ETIAS system is a long way down the line and provides a one size fits all approach for those who don't need a visa but don't benefit from freedom of movement. The USA has notoriously difficult entry laws for those with criminal convictions and they are still subject to the ETIAS rules.

I think Simon means 10 years ago.... We have to remember that this is all subject to practicalities. For a start, every EU member country has a different criminal records system, and ours appears to be harsher than any of theirs. Some countries don't always record convictions unless the punishment reaches a certain threshold. So, someone might have a recent conviction that isn't shown on their record, and they could enter the UK as if they had not been convicted. As access to those criminal records systems via ECRIS depends on accepting the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice, it is almost certainly not going to happen, so this is effectively just bluster to appease the tabloids. If the EU does decide to mirror what we do, they will be facing an enormous amount of paperwork if they're going to want a police certificate for every visit. Apparently, there were millions of journeys from the UK to the EU last year. Not all of them would be by UK citizens, but we're still talking tens of millions. If they start insisting on a police certificate (£55 per person) for each trip, that is a very heavy tax on tourism, although I'm sure it would be welcomed by Turkey and other non-EU countries. I strongly suspect that when the dust settles, we'll still be using ETIAS and facing the same disclose/don't disclose dilemma that faces travellers to the USA/Canada/Australia and other countries.

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If you are to punish a man retributively you must injure him. If you are to reform him you must improve him. And men are not improved by injuries. (George Bernard Shaw)

Hi guys agree with all of you it is a mess, if you look at the current information out there on the new etias system that comes in if your offence was over 10 hrs ago then you don’t have to declare it, but who know what will happen now

This was one of my big concerns post brexit, and having the likes of miss Patel as Home Secretary, she wants to bring in a system on par with entry with the USA, and following today’s announcement it will be interesting to see how the eu respond

It will be interesting to see if there are any court actions from people that were ok to travel to Europe one day then can’t the next

My Irish passport application is looking more realistic as the days go bye

If u can’t guess I voted no to brexit for this very reason that freedom of movement would go