Augusto Santos Silva highlighted that “from January next year, the United Kingdom will be sovereign in terms of migration policy”.
“Even if these rules do not have the agreement of the European Union and the other Member States, that is why the United Kingdom voted for Brexit”, said Santos Silva.
The United Kingdom announced on 9 February that it will adopt new rules for post-Brexit immigration, making it harder for European Union citizens to access and imposing requirements, such as speaking English, qualifications and a minimum wage of £25,600 (€30,800).
The minister guaranteed, however, that Portugal not only does not intend to adopt any type of retaliation in relation to the United Kingdom’s migration policy and does not recommend this to any of the other member states of the European Union.
“We must not forget that the United Kingdom is the first tourism market in Portugal”, therefore “we are very interested in treating the British well”, he said.
However the minister conceded that if the UK goes ahead with their migration plans it would make it difficult for future relations. “It is not imaginable that we can achieve a very close relationship in matters of commercial, defence, security, among others”, while maintaining a migratory policy as the United Kingdom defends, said Augusto Santos Silva.