France Mulls Lifting Work Restrictions for Bulgarians, Romanians

Politics » BULGARIA IN EU | August 17, 2012, Friday // 12:32
Bulgaria: France Mulls Lifting Work Restrictions for Bulgarians, Romanians

French government officials are to meet next week to decide on lifting labor market restrictions for Bulgarian and Romanian nationals, thereby granting legal status to some 15 000 Roma from the two countries living in France.

French Interior Minister Manuel Valls, as cited by news portal Euractiv, said that giving work rights to the Roma, who usually inhabit illegal makeshift camps, "could be one of the solutions" to the migrant community.

Civil rights groups have long insisted that the integration of the Roma is impossible without giving them work rights.

The French government has often come under criticism from human rights activists due to the dismantled Roma settlements and the forced repatriation of Roma.

According to Euractiv, some 90% of the Roma in France are from Romania, the rest being mostly from Bulgaria.

France, as well as the other EU countries, must lift labor market restrictions for Bulgarian and Romanian citizens by January 1, 2014, as the two countries' EU accession treaties provide.

The nine countries that still require work permits from Bulgarians and Romanians are France, Austria, Belgium, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.

As of January 2012, Germany eased restrictions for Bulgarian and Romanian seasonal workers, skilled workers with a university degree whose employment corresponds to their professional qualification, and for workers undergoing professional in-firm training.

On July 20, Ireland dropped work restrictions for Bulgarian and Romanian nationals.

Spain had opened completely to Bulgarians and Romanians, but obtained a "safeguard"in August 2011 limiting further arrival of Romanian workers on its crisis-hit labor market.

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Tags: Roma, work restrictions, Romania, Bulgaria, France, Manuel Valls, French Interior Minister

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