Western doors still closed to eastern workers

On the brink of the 50th anniversary of the European Union, freedom of movement for workers, one of the founding principles of the EC treaty, seems further away than ever. Last year, the EU’s much trumpeted ‘year of workers’ mobility’ ended on something of a bum note, with many member states choosing to close the door on jobseekers from new entrants Romania and Bulgaria.

It was not the warmest of welcomes. Citizens in member states such as the UK almost choked on their left-over Christmas turkey as the media reported imminent invasions of new workers from the East, often accompanied by pictures of donkeys and wooden carts intended to depict the pitiful state of the economies they would be seeking to flee.

"This is a bit of a repetition of what happened in the run-up to enlargement in 2004," says Tony Venables, director of the Brussels-based European Citizen Action Service.

"Unfortunately, you have a lowest-common denominator situation, with countries announcing they are putting restrictions on immigration leading their neighbours to do the same."

Following 2004’s ‘Big Bang’ enlargement, when ten new member states joined the EU, and this year’s entry of Bulgaria and Romania into the club, intra-EU migration policies have become somewhat unwieldy, a patchwork of rules and restrictions imposed by nervous member states.

Back in 2004, all EU15 countries bar the UK, Ireland and Sweden, introduced strict limitations on workers from the former communist countries in eastern Europe, the so-called EU8. Of these, Denmark, Belgium, France and Luxembourg have since eased their restrictions for jobseekers in specific high-demand sectors. The change of regime in these member states will now apply not only to EU8 countries, but also to Romania and to Bulgaria.

"It’s progress, but at the same time it’s very self-interested progress," says Elizabeth Collett, a policy analyst at the European Policy Centre, a Brussels-based think-tank, pointing out that member states in the West, with their skill gaps and workforce shortages, need increased immigration, not only from within the EU, but also from third countries.

The UK and Ireland, which both opened their doors to eastern European workers in 2004, have taken a step backwards this year, opting to impose curbs on Romanian and Bulgarian workers. Hungary, which complained so bitterly two years ago when its citizens were shut out of western European countries, has decided to follow suit with new restrictions of its own. All rules will have a shelf-life of seven years, with reviews compulsory after two years.

"Rather than putting restrictions on the basis of what might happen, it would be better for member states to say: we’ll see what happens, monitor the migration patterns and, if there are problems, we can revert to a safeguard clause," says Venables. So far, however, only Sweden and Finland have been bold enough to adopt open policies towards all new member states. For the latter, which shut out EU8 workers in 2004, this is a significant leap of faith.

Few, however, are brave enough to take such a gamble. The irony is that some experts believe most of the immigration flows from Bulgaria and Romania to EU15 countries may already have taken place. "It [migration] has gone in the direction of Spain, Italy and Portugal," says Venables.

Until economic conditions in Bulgaria and Romania improve, most ‘old’ member states will be reluctant to open their doors. Venables argues, however, that differences in costs of living and wages can cut both ways. "If you come from a country where wages are low, the high-cost of living [elsewhere] may be a deterrent," he says.

Other deterrents could include complex bureaucracies, employment systems and language barriers. At the end of 2006, after a series of European Commission initiatives intended to encourage citizens to up sticks and cross borders, overall figures for worker mobility still stood below 4%.

For all the scare-mongering, migration, it seems, remains an activity reserved for the few who are brave enough to venture onto new pastures.

On the brink of the 50th anniversary of the European Union, freedom of movement for workers, one of the founding principles of the EC treaty, seems further away than ever. Last year, the EU’s much trumpeted ‘year of workers’ mobility’ ended on something of a bum note, with many member states choosing to close the door on jobseekers from new entrants Romania and Bulgaria.