EU Right to Movement immigration path? (UK)

Cripes.  A very strange way to do it, but as you say...better than abolishing it completely. Way to go, Garry!   

Aw shucks.

It's a bit tricky, but the provision is safe.  We'll need some sort of how-to guide on how to access the long-term marriage provision without being ensnared in a catch-22.

Oh gosh.  *covering eyes*  What catch-22's would these be...?  Do I really WANT to know?  LOL

I am sure you have probabaly already thought of this, but just in case you haven't, you might want to check the rules of the countries you are planning on living in just to make sure that THEY will allow you to be there for the period of time you need.  I say this with some experience, being American born, moved to Sweden when I married, got my Swedish citizenship, but before I did, we had talked about moving to France, it was a no-go situation for me.

Firstly, SOME EU countries will not let a non-EU person, even if married to an EU citizen, work there.  France wouldn't, without special circumstances (i.e., me being a brain surgeon or something).  Even while I had permanent residency in Sweden, but had not yet gotten my citizenship, there were a LOT of hoops I would have had to jump through, so my husband ended up turning down the job there.

Oh gosh.  *covering eyes*  What catch-22's would these be...?  Do I really WANT to know?  LOL

There's a discussion about it in the advocacy thread

Idaho, that's interesting about France.  I had read somewhere (EU site, I think) that the non-EU spouse of an EU citizen is supposed to have the same rights to work and reside in an EU country as their spouse, but might need an entry visa depending upon their country of origin/citizenship.  I have checked up in Belgium and the Netherlands, and apparently I'd need the entry visa, supposedly a fairly easy process.  I'll have to look more closely after next week's conversations!

Garry, I'll go take a look in the advocacy threads!  Whewooooo....

Sorry to be so dense again...Garry, do you mean the discussion on the SET(M) form (clarity of forms and applications and what not)?  I've been trolling through the Advocacy forum and not finding anything specifically about long-term marriage provisions and catch-22s?  Could you perhaps tell me if I'm looking in the correct place?

I don't know why, but I felt I had to look up the info for France. This is the only thing I've found so far, Idaho: http://www.legislationline.org/?tid=137&jid=19&less=false

Now it's nearly 4:30 am, so I suppose I ought to get to bed.

As far as I understand Idaho, non EU / EEA citizens who are married to EU / EEA citizens have the same right of free movement as their EU / EEA spouse.
  Sounds like what you have been told is not correct, IMO......

Rights as a spouse of an EU / EEA citizen:

"YOUR RIGHTS
As a member of the family of a worker who is a national of the European Union and the European Economic Area, you enjoy the same right of residence as the employed person himself (regardless of whether or not you yourself are a EU and EEA national).

The following members of the family have the right to install themselves with the worker:

the spouse and their descendants who are under the age of 21 years or are dependants;
dependent relatives in the ascending line of the worker and his/her spouse.
Facilities will be accorded to the admission of any other member of the family who is dependent on the worker or who lived under his roof in the country of origin.

If you are the spouse or the child of an EU/EEA worker, you may take up any activity as an employed person without a work permit irrespective of your nationality."

See http://ec.europa.eu/youreurope/nav/en/citizens/living/right-residence/workers-family-member/index_en.html

Another important issue is to not assume that as a spouse of a EU / EEA citizen, that you will be able to naturalise easily and / or that your country of residence allows multiple nationality, e.g. Germany has long residency and multiple citizenship restrictions. So you need to understand the rules for naturalisation in your EU / EEA country of residence very clearly to understand long term consequences, if this is a goal of yours to increase general freedom of movement.

It seems as if everything changes so FAST, and even in the very short time that I've started looking at this stuff, I've started being very careful to check for a date on any information I've found, and giving precedence to governmental websites before personal ones.  Anything undated is assumed to be suspicious, and all comes with the caveat that there might be things (like the Life in the UK test) that aren't mentioned yet.

I don't know that these are always entirely safe assumptions.  Thanks for helping me keep everything straight, y'all.

Still looking for that advocacy thread, Garry!

Still looking for that advocacy thread, Garry!

Sorry, it's here...  http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=32899.0

but it still doesn't have the how-to guide.

Hmmm.  Garry, is that a restricted board?  I get the message "The topic or board you are looking for appears to be either missing or off limits to you."  Is there another way for me to get to that thread?

Garry, the thread you're linking to is under the Management section and still has some restrictions on it...

We can start a thread under the regular Advocacy board if anyone wants to put together some information...

Garry, the thread you're linking to is under the Management section and still has some restrictions on it...

Huh?  What are the restrictions?   

sending you a pm...

sending you a pm...

Ok, understood.