Schengen zone pros and cons

International visitors to the UK and Ireland face higher fees and extra form-filling compared to most other countries within the European Union. Emma Blee looks at the pros and cons of joining the Schengen visa zone.

Under the Schengen Agreement, people can move freely across the EU’s national borders without the need for separate visas or passport checks. While being part of the zone could help boost tourism, an increase in levels of immigration to the EU during the 1990s has left the open border concept controversial.

Its history dates back to 1957, when the Treaty of Rome asked member states to allow freedom of movement for citizens across internal borders. However, as there was very little progress, governments in France, West Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands decided to pursue a joint policy, resulting in the 1985 Schengen Agreement.

Schengen now includes 22 EU countries and three non-EU nations – Norway, Iceland and Switzerland. It covers 396 million people and the only countries outside the zone are Ireland, the UK, Bulgaria, Romania and Cyprus.

The Agreement was designed to promote trade and integration between different nationalities as well as encourage tourism from emerging markets such as China and India.

In the past, tourists entering the EU would have needed a separate visa for each country they wanted to visit. However, as part of the zone they can apply for a single visa that gives them access to any of the countries that have signed up.

Police controls are concentrated at Schengen’s external borders – land borders, international airports and sea ports.

All members of the zone share responsibility for policing. The Schengen Information System (SIS) also requires customs, police and justice authorities in the member states to share information about criminal and terrorist activity.

To join the Schengen zone, countries must meet stringent regulations regarding air borders, visas, police co-operation and personal data protection.

Border control

When in government, Labour opted out of the Schengen Agreement and created the UK Border Agency so there would be “a strong force at the border bringing together immigration, customs and visa checks”.

David Cameron has also refused to join the zone as he wants the UK to be able to control its own borders. In their 2009 European manifesto, the Liberal Democrats stated that they did not want the UK to join Schengen “in the foreseeable future”.

In August, though, Cameron said he was keen to boost the number of Chinese tourists: “Currently we only have 0.5 per cent of the market share of Chinese tourists. If we could increase that to just 2.5 per cent this could add over half a billion pounds of spending to our economy and this could mean as many as 10,000 new jobs.”

At present, people can move freely throughout the British Isles without a passport. Therefore, the Common Travel Area between Northern Ireland and the South would make it difficult for the Republic to join the zone without the UK also signing up, as this could lead to immigration problems.

However, in a letter to leaders of the North’s main political parties in January, Irish Labour MEP Nessa Childers called on the Executive to break with UK policy and consider joining the Schengen zone.

She claimed that if the Republic and the North achieve an all-Ireland entry, it would make it easier for tourists to travel through the whole of Ireland.

Freedom

Alliance’s Stephen Farry also believes that both the UK and Republic of Ireland should be members: “The Schengen Agreement delivers freedom of movement for European citizens. It effectively removes internal border controls within Europe, but also strengthens common external borders.”

He has argued that a “hot-pursuit protocol” whereby police could cross borders and work together to tackle crime, would be an advantage.

SDLP MLA Pól Callaghan has called for the UK government to look at the economic benefits of joining the Schengen zone: “Due to the bilateral arrangement between Ireland and Britain, we have the free moving border between the North and South. However, a move into Schengen may be a better option for this island’s economy.”

He gave an example of how the zone works in practice: “A lady who travels to Lourdes once a year for a religious trip from this island requires a passport, yet another lady from mainland Europe within the Schengen zone making the same annual trip doesn’t, even though both are fully committed members of the European Union.”

Callaghan argues that in stringent times “anything that can ease the travel of commodities between borders can only be a good thing.”

But there has been stiff opposition to the concept by other local parties. During an Assembly debate on the subject in April 2008, DUP MLA Simon Hamilton argued that giving up control of visas and elements of immigration “is not in the interests of the UK and must be opposed”.

He stated that if the UK were to sign up to Schengen, it would mean sub-contracting elements of border control to other countries. “There is also the issue of national sovereignty. There are few issues that define national sovereignty as much as border control,” Hamilton remarked.

Alex Maskey was also against joining the Agreement at that time, as it allows for the collection of information on people without their consent.

“Sinn Féin is opposed to this country’s adopting the Schengen Agreement until such a protocol has all the necessary appropriate safeguards built in for all its citizens. No democratic country wants to aspire to, or avail itself of, an unaccountable, invisible system,” he commented.

Ulster Conservative and Unionist MEP Jim Nicholson told agendaNi that there are “more disadvantages to joining the Schengen zone than there are advantages”. Like Cameron, he believes immigration policy is “best dealt with and controlled” at a member state level and joining the zone could inhibit this.

Other disadvantages, he said, are a possible rise in drugs smuggling and human trafficking: “Our borders would be more exposed and therefore more vulnerable to criminal activity.”

Nicholson, though, doesn’t think tourists will be put off visiting Ireland because of extra form-filling: “I don’t think tourists see visa applications as red tape. They see it as normal protocol that a country maintains to control their borders.”

Why Schengen?

This is the name of the town in Luxembourg, where the Agreement was signed in 1985. The signing itself took place on a boat in the middle of the Moselle river, which forms the border between Luxembourg and Germany.