British nationals residing in European Union member states are now not allowed to vote or stand in native and municipal elections, the bloc's high courtroom dominated on Thursday.
The case was dropped at the European Court docket of Justice (ECJ) in Luxembourg by "EP", a British nationwide married to a French citizen and who has been dwelling in France since 1984.
EP by no means utilized for French citizenship and realised within the lead-up to the March 2020 municipal elections — held six weeks after the Withdrawal Settlement establishing the phrases of the UK's orderly withdrawal from the EU got here into power — that she had been taken off the electoral roll.
She filed an software to be re-registered on the French electoral roll in October of the identical yr however was swiftly denied by the mayor of the municipality in Thoux, southwestern France.
EP then took the matter to courtroom asserting that it meant she was now not in a position to vote or stand in for native elections wherever as British nationals who've resided overseas for greater than 15 years are now not allowed to take part in UK elections.
The ECJ, to whom the courtroom was referred, dominated that for the reason that Withdrawal Settlement got here into power on 1 February 2020, British nationals "now not benefit from the standing of citizen of the Union, nor, extra particularly the precise to vote and to face as a candidate in municipal elections of their Member State of residence, together with the place they're additionally disadvantaged, by advantage of the regulation of the State of which they're nationals, of the precise to vote in elections held by that State."
It famous that solely citizenship of an EU member state confers the precise to vote or stand in an election.
The ECJ added that nationals of a 3rd nation that was once a member state (who due to this fact used to have an EU citizenship) weren't in a position to retain that standing even when they transferred their residence to a different member state.
Within the case of Brexit, this is applicable to individuals who transferred their residence to an EU member state earlier than the tip of the transition interval.
"That is an automated consequence of the only sovereign choice taken by the UK to withdraw from the European Union," the ECJ mentioned in a press assertion.
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