EU Closes Door On Croatian Workers

There is bad news for the 346,000 unemployed Croatians who think that Croatia’s entry to the European Union from 1 July 2013 will open the door for employment opportunities on the continent.

Croatia’s RTL Television reports that most of the larger EU nations will exercise their right to ban Croatian workers from gaining employment in their countries for 7 years. 15 EU nations have the right to put restriction on workers from new member states for two, three, or seven years.

The UK have already sent a letter of intent stating that they will enforce the 7 year ban on Croatian workers. RTL’s diplomatic sources say that Austria and Germany will follow suit.

The EU’s latest members, Romania and Bulgaria, both had working restrictions enforced on them by most member states including the Netherlands,Germany, Austria, France, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Luxembourg and Malta.Italy and Ireland recently removed the restrictions which they initially put in place.

There could be even further bad news when from 1 July 2013 unemployed people from EU states such as Bulgaria and Romania can freely join the Croatian job market.