Common Travel Area
The Common Travel Area is an open borders area comprising the United Kingdom, Ireland, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands. The British Overseas Territories are not included. Governed by non-binding agreements, the CTA maintains minimal border controls, allowing easy passage for British and Irish citizens with limited identity documentation, albeit with some exceptions. Sustaining the CTA requires cooperation between British and Irish immigration authorities.
In 2014, the British and Irish governments initiated a trial programme to recognise each other's visas for travel within the CTA., this programme extends to Chinese and Indian nationals, albeit with restrictions on certain visa categories. Nationals of other countries and holders of non-qualifying visas must obtain separate visas for both countries and are not eligible for transit visa exceptions if travelling through the United Kingdom to Ireland.
Since 1997, the Irish government has implemented systematic identity checks on air travellers arriving from the United Kingdom and selective checks on sea travellers, with occasional checks at land borders.
History
1923 agreement
The Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in December 1922, at a time when systematic passport and immigration controls were becoming standard at international frontiers. Although the British had imposed entry controls in the pastnotably during the French Revolutionthe imposition of such controls in the 20th century dated from the Aliens Act 1905, before which there was a system of registration for arriving foreigners.Before the creation of the Irish Free State, British immigration law applied in Ireland as part of the United Kingdom. With the imminent prospect of the secession of most of Ireland from the United Kingdom in 1922, the British Home Office was disinclined to impose passport and immigration controls between the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland, which would have meant patrolling a porous and meandering long land border. If, however, the pre-1922 situation were to be continued, the new Irish immigration authorities would have to continue to enforce British immigration policy after independence. The Department of Home Affairs in the newly established Irish Free State was found to be receptive to continuing with the status quo and an informal agreement to this effect was reached in February 1923: each side would enforce the other's immigration decisions and the Irish authorities would be provided with a copy of the UK's suspect-codex of any persona non grata in the United Kingdom.
The agreement was provided for in British law by deeming the Irish Free State, which was a dominion, to be part of the United Kingdom for the purposes of immigration law. It was fully implemented in 1925 when legislation passed in both states provided for the recognition of the other's landing conditions for foreigners. This may be considered to have been the high point of the CTAalthough it was not called that at the timeas it almost amounted to a common immigration area. A foreigner who had been admitted to one state could, unless his or her admission had been conditional upon not entering the other state, travel to the other with only minimal bureaucratic requirements. In December 1937, the Irish Free State was renamed in British law Eire.
The CTA was suspended on the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, and travel restrictions were introduced between the islands of Great Britain and Ireland. This meant that travel restrictions even applied to people travelling within the UK if they were travelling from Northern Ireland to elsewhere in the UK.
1952 agreement
After the war, the Irish re-instated their previous provisions allowing free movement, but the British declined to do so pending the agreement of a "similar immigration policy" in both states. Consequently, the British maintained immigration controls between the islands of Ireland and Great Britain until 1952, to the consternation of Northern Ireland's Unionist population. In 1949 The Republic of Ireland Act abolished the last remaining functions of the British monarch from Irish law, which resulted in Ireland leaving the Commonwealth of Nations as it had become a republic.No agreement on a similar immigration policy was publicised at the time, but a year after the Irish Minister for Justice referred to the lifting of immigration controls between the two islands as "a matter for the British themselves", the British began referring to the CTA in legislation for the first time. The content of the agreement is provided for in relevant immigration law.
The CTA has meant that Ireland has been required to follow changes in British immigration policy. The Commonwealth Immigrants Act 1962 imposed immigration controls between the United Kingdom and Commonwealth countries. In Ireland, the Aliens Order 1962 replaced the state's previous provision exempting all British subjects from immigration control with one exempting only those born in the United Kingdom. The scope of the Irish provision was thus more restrictive than the British legislation as it excluded from immigration control only those British citizens born in the United Kingdom, and imposed immigration controls on those born outside the UK. The latter group would have included individuals who were British citizens by descent or by birth in a British colony. This discrepancy between the UK's and Ireland's definition of a British citizen was not resolved until 1999 by an order which exempted all British citizens from immigration control.
2008 proposal
In July 2008, the UK Border Agency published a consultation paper on the CTA that envisaged the imposition of immigration controls for non-CTA nationals, and new measures for identity checks of CTA nationals, as well as an advance passenger information system, on all air and sea crossings between the islands of Ireland and Great Britain.While passport controls were proposed to be applied to travellers between Great Britain and the Republic of Ireland, the nature of possible identity controls between Great Britain and Northern Ireland was not clear. This led to controversy because Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom, and a prominent Unionist described the proposed arrangements as "intolerable and preposterous". The nature of identity checks between Northern Ireland and Great Britain was characterised by the British government as follows:
As far as the land border is concerned, the proposal indicated that the border would be "lightly controlled" and a joint statement in 2008 by both governments confirmed that there are no plans for fixed controls on either side of the border.
On 1 April 2009, an amendment moved by Lord Glentoran in the House of Lords defeated the British government's proposal and preserved the CTA. The relevant clause was re-introduced by Home Office minister Phil Woolas in the Public Bill Committee in June, but again removed in July after opposition pressure.
2011 memorandum of understanding
2011 marked the first public agreement between the British and Irish governments concerning the maintenance of the CTA. Officially entitled the "Joint Statement Regarding Co-Operation on Measures to Secure the External Common Travel Area Border" it was signed in Dublin on 20 December 2011 by the UK's immigration minister, Damian Green, and Ireland's Minister for Justice and Equality, Alan Shatter. The two ministers also signed an unpublished memorandum of understanding at the same time.In common with its non-published predecessors, the 2011 agreement is nonbinding, with its eighth clause stating that the agreement "is not intended to create legally binding obligations, nor to create or confer any right, privilege or benefit on any person or party, private or public".
The agreement commits the two governments to continue their co-operation through the CTA, to align their lists of visa-free countries, to develop "electronic border management system/s", to engage in data sharing to combat the "abuse" of the CTA, and to work toward a "fully-common short stay visit visa".
2016–2017: Brexit
The UK voted to leave the European Union in a referendum on 23 June 2016. This withdrawal from the EU makes the Republic of Ireland–United Kingdom border on the island of Ireland an external border of the European Union. However, the Irish and British governments and the President of the European Council have stated that they do not wish for a hard border in Ireland, taking into account the historical and social "sensitivities" that permeate the island. In September 2016 the British Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, David Davis, stated that the British government would not seek a return to a "hard border" between the UK and Ireland.In October 2016, the British and Irish governments considered in outline a plan entailing British immigration controls being applied at Ireland's ports and airports after Brexit, so that the UK might control migration by EU citizens across the open border into the United Kingdom. This would avoid passport checks being required between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. However, this agreement was never finalised and was met by opposition from political parties in Ireland. On 23 March 2017, it was confirmed that British immigration officials would not be allowed to use Ireland's ports and airports.
In June 2017, the British government's policy paper on the position of EU citizens in the UK stated a desire to "protect the Common Travel Area arrangements", stating that "Irish citizens residing in the UK will not need to apply for 'settled status' to protect their entitlements".
2019 memorandum of understanding
On 8 May 2019, Tánaiste Simon Coveney and British Cabinet Office minister David Lidington signed a memorandum of understanding in an effort to secure the rights of Irish and British citizens post-Brexit. The document was signed in London before a meeting of the British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference, putting the rights of both states' citizens, already in place under the Common Travel Area, on a more secure footing.Paragraph 17 of the memorandum of understanding states: "The foregoing record represents the common understanding of the Participants upon the matters referred to therein. It is not of itself intended to create legally binding obligations. The longstanding durability of the CTA has benefited from a degree of flexibility and the detail of the foregoing arrangements may continue to evolve".
The agreement, which is the culmination of over two years' work of both governments, means the rights of both countries' citizens are protected after Brexit while also ensuring that Ireland will continue to meet its obligations under EU law. The agreement took effect on 31 January 2020 when the United Kingdom actually left the European Union.