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Spain and UK set to give each other’s residents post-Brexit voting rights in local elections

Madrid and London are finalising a bilateral agreement that will give British residents in Spain and Spanish residents in the UK the right to vote in post-Brexit local elections in the country they live in.

Published: 17 December 2018 08:53 CET
Spain and UK set to give each other's residents post-Brexit voting rights in local elections
Photos: AFP

Spain and Britain’s governments have decided to streamline a deal that will protect the rights of its expat citizens in either country post March 29th, the day the UK leaves the EU. 

The bilateral agreement will guarantee that Brits in Spain and Spaniards in the UK can continue to vote in local elections, or elecciones municipales as they are known in Spain.

Until now, Britain’s impending break-away from the EU was set to leave both groups without any voting rights in their country of residence, whereas as part of the bloc, registered residents even had the right to stand as candidates in local elections.

There are in fact currently 37 locally elected British town and city councillors in Spain, mostly in Comunidad Valenciana and Andalusia, the two Spanish regions with the highest number of British residents.

The current negotiation will ensure that the 280,000 Brits officially residing in Spain keep these two rights and will be able place their ballots – or stand – in Spain’s next local elections in May 2019.

That’s regardless of whether or not there’s a no-deal Brexit scenario which causes Brits to lose their EU rights as of March 30th 2019, rather than in December 2020, the month in which the transition breakaway period is scheduled to end in the event of a deal.

This deal is of course a reciprocal one which will be treated as an international treaty that has to be ratified by Spain and Britain’s parliaments.

According to leading Spanish daily El País, the agreement is being “negotiated at top speed” between May and Sánchez’s government but diplomatic sources did tell the paper it’s unlikely to be approved and ready in time for Spain’s local elections on May 26, 2019.

Spain’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs is therefore prepared for the agreement to come into action in a provisional sense as soon as the initial frame line is agreed upon.

Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs Josep Borrell is also calling on the UK Embassy in Madrid to encourage the “several tens of thousands” of Brits in Spain who aren’t registered yet to do so in order to guarantee that they are protected by other contingency plans set to be rolled out including residency, health and work post Brexit in Spain.

For this the UK must deliver the same rights to the 115,000 Spaniards residing in “Gran Bretaña”.

Spain's local elections next May will determine which councillors are chosen in the country's 8,116 municipalities and what seats political parties hold in the 38 provincial councils.

The municipal elections will be held simultaneously with regional elections in most of Spain's autonomous communities. 
 

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BRITONS IN SPAIN

FACT CHECK: Spain’s ‘£97 daily rule’ isn’t new nor a worry for British tourists

The British tabloids are at it again causing alarm over the so-called '£97 daily rule’ which Spain is apparently imposing on UK tourists, who in turn are threatening to ‘boycott’ the country. 

Published: 15 April 2024 14:28 CEST
FACT CHECK: Spain's '£97 daily rule' isn't new nor a worry for British tourists

American playwright Eugene O’Neill once said: “There is no present or future – only the past, happening over and over again – now”.

In 2022, The Local Spain wrote a fact-checking article titled ‘Are UK tourists in Spain really being asked to prove €100 a day?‘, in which we dispelled the claims made in the British press about Spain’s alleged new rules for UK holidaymakers.

Two years on in 2024, the same eye-catching headlines are resurfacing in Blighty: “’Anti-British? Holiday elsewhere!’ Britons fume as tourists in Spain warned they may be subject to additional rules” in GB News, or “’They would be begging us to come back’: Brits vow to ‘boycott Spain’ over new £97 daily rule” in LBC.

The return of this rabble-rousing ‘news’ in the UK has coincided with calls within Spain to change the existing mass tourism model that’s now more than ever having an impact on the country’s housing crisis.

Even though Spaniards behind the protests have not singled out any foreign nationals as potential culprits, the UK tabloids have unsurprisingly capitalised on this and run headlines such as “Costa del Sol turns on British tourists”.

READ MORE: Why does hatred of tourists in Spain appear to be on the rise?

What is the so-called ‘£97 daily rule’?

Yes, there is theoretically a ‘£97 a day rule’, but it is not a new rule, nor one that applies only to UK nationals specifically, and not even one that Spain alone has imposed (all Schengen countries set their financial means threshold).

As non-EU nationals who are not from a Schengen Area country either (the United Kingdom never was in Schengen), British tourists entering Spain could have certain requirements with which to comply if asked by Spanish border officials.

Such requirements include a valid passport, proof of a return ticket, documents proving their purpose of entry into Spain, limits on the amount of time they can spend in Spain (the 90 out of 180 days Schengen rule), proof of accommodation, a letter of invitation if staying with friends or family (another controversial subject in the British press when it emerged) and yes, proof of sufficient financial means for the trip.

Third-country nationals who want to enter Spain in 2024 may need to prove they have at least €113,40 per day (around £97), with a minimum of €972 (around £830) per person regardless of the intended duration of the stay. It is unclear whether this could also possibly apply to minors.

The amount of financial means to prove has increased slightly in 2024 as it is linked to Spain’s minimum wage, which has also risen. 

Financial means can be accredited by presenting cash, traveller’s checks, credit cards accompanied by a bank account statement, an up-to-date bank book or any other means that proves the amount available as credit on a card or bank account.

Have Britons been prevented from entering Spain for not having enough money?

There is no evidence that UK holidaymakers have been prevented from entering Spain after not being able to show they have £97 a day to cover their stay, nor any reports that they have been asked to show the financial means to cover their stay either. 

17.3 million UK tourists visited Spain in 2023; equal to roughly 47,400 a day. 

Even though British tourists have to stand in the non-EU queue at Spanish passport control, they do not require a visa to enter Spain and the sheer number of UK holidaymakers means that they’re usually streamlined through the process, having to only quickly show their passports.

The only occasional hiccups that have arisen post-Brexit have been at the land border between Gibraltar and Spain (issued that are likely to be resolved soon), and these weren’t related to demonstrating financial means. 

Therefore, the British press are regurgitating alarmist headlines that don’t reflect any truth, but rather pander to the ‘they need us more than we need them’ mantra that gets readers clicking. 

To sum up, there is a £97 a day rule, but it is not new, it has not affected any British tourists to date, and it is not specific to Spain alone to potentially require proof of economic means. 

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