Although Denmark has signed the Schengen Agreement, it can choose whether or not to apply any new measures taken under Title IV of the EC Treaty within the EU framework, even those that constitute a development of the Schengen acquis.
Simply pointing out that you said they had not signed the agreement, when in fact they have. In accordance with the protocol to the Treaty of Amsterdam, Ireland and the United Kingdom can take part in some or all of the Schengen arrangements, if the Schengen Member States and the government representative of the country in question vote unanimously in favour within the Council. In March 1999, the United Kingdom asked to cooperate in some aspects of Schengen, namely police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters, the fight against drugs and the SIS. The Council Decision 2000/365/EC approving the request by the United Kingdom was adopted on 29 May 2000. In June 2000, Ireland too asked to take part in some aspects of Schengen, roughly corresponding to the aspects covered by the United Kingdom’s request.
Frenchie - whatever the laws are on free movement, the reality is something different. The fact that there is a wide difference within the EU regarding wage differences etc. eg. comparison between eg. Rumania or Poland on the lowest paid scale and Denmark or Luxembourg at the highest does not mean that people are actually using these freedoms. Theoretically qualifications in one EU country are automatically recognized in others - in practice it doesn't work that way because to practice any profession other than picking apples would need some linguistic knowledge. This is one of the reasons why Germany is not attracting as many migrants as it should do. Firstly because few people outside of Germany, Austria and Switzerland have a working knowledge of the German language. Secondly because learning it does not open as many doors as English, French or Spanish. Thirdly because the Germans have a problem accepting or recognizing foreign qualifications - in fact a degree obtained in Hamburg is not automatically accepted in Bavaria. In practice most Europeans are staying at home !
I don't disagree with you. If you have a UK qualification it is not recognized in France most of the time. Many things that should happen do not, or there is a ridiculous delay.
Sorry Frenchie - my mistake. Denmark has 4 opt out clauses - in currency, membership of the Western Union (Defence), opt outs in the area of freedom, security and justice, and also regarding citizenship. All of this combined with border controls led me to believe they hadn't signed.
The schengen agreement is effectively dead. No government will take the risk of being accused of assisting terrorists by having an open border.
I think that you underestimate how porous Europe's borders are even without Schengen. Schengen was only fully implemented after 1995 yet I had been crossing Europe's borders also for many years before this without controls. Some European borders have never had really effective controls - I have never been controlled on the Belgian/Dutch border for example even though I was travelling extensively in both countries back in the 70s. I have also been in the situation of not knowing which country I was in whilst in the Pyrenees - so I think that if terrorists really want to get in then they can (even with border controls) - or are you suggesting barbed wire around the whole of Germany etc. in order to protect 9 land borders. What is needed is real police cooperation and possibly the establishment of a 'European' police force - because the situation at the moment is that if eg. a runaway car crosses the French border then the German police have to stop and inform their French colleagues - that has to change with the establishment of joint policing of border areas.
The main core of Schengen (note spelling!!) is 'no internal border controls'. That is not what is happening in practice. Although the checks are meant to be temporary It will be an awfully long time, maybe never, when member states agree to reinstate borderless crossings between countries. So in effect it is well and truly dead.
I'm sure many crooks, terrorists and drug runners were apprehended in the passport controls before Schengen, I'm sure many will be now controls are back in place.
You really are living in cloud cuckoo land if you think that terrorists would try to get through borders by showing their passports at controls. Do you know how long some of these European borders are ? Anyway, I don't really see what this has to do with the debate on EU membership/referendum. Britain has its controls, nobody is asking them to lift them in any way and these would remain unaffected by Britain's leaving.
Fortunately every country in Europe has introduced new border controls to hopefully stem some terrorists. Do they all live in cloud cuckoo land or are they all taking sensible precautions? Letting terrorists travel right through Europe without border controls effect every country including the UK. Some of the Paris terrorists came from Syria without checks as did the Belgium based terrorists that were able to go back and forth. If Turkey monitors the Syria bound UK jihadists better more of them will revert to travelling through Europe. It also becomes the UK's problem by letting migrants travel up to Calais unheeded, then cause chaos.
Every week I read of drug runners being arrested on the autoroutes because of information received, not because someone looked at their passport at a border. Gathering this information is what is important, and the maximum cooperation between countries should be supported. The PM in Belgium has clearly received information which is why he is keeping the controls in place in Brussels. With mobile phones, the internet and social media being used by the undesirables, looking at a passport is rather old hat. If you wish to believe in the power of border controls, then you need to have a common passport that can be read by any immigration officer in any country which will record your movement from one country to another. How many UK citizens have not been to Syria yet could become bombers? We have no idea, so are relying on security services to monitor what is going on.
France has announced 'indefinite' border controls so they, along with every other country, obviously think it is another useful tool in the battle against undesirables. To me and them it seems a common sense approach. Border controls are not an alternative to intelligence it is complementary.
"All EU citizens would face much tighter and systematic ID checks when leaving or entering Europe’s 26-country free-travel area, under new demands France is making of its EU partners following the terror attacks in Paris." "If endorsed by EU interior ministers on Friday, the French demands would severely affect Britons travelling to and from the continent because the crackdown would apply not to the internal but to the external borders of the free-travel zone known as Schengen, of which Britain is not a part. The Franco-British border is an external Schengen border."
