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Originally Posted by Kieran Colfer:

Originally Posted by Dennis Young:

I dont think its a fair statement though.  Jose Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission said the commission "will take all necessary steps" to enforce the law.   In other words, Barroso seems to be trying to threaten another European country with the law.

Free borders within Europe was brought in with the Schengen Agreement in 1985, and was then brought into European law in 1997 with the Amsterdam Treaty. So, he's not "threatening them with the law", this is the law.  If you sign a treaty, you have to abide by it's clauses, no?  

Sure.  But my point was that a country should never sign away its own ability to decide for itself what its laws will be.

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Just of of interest, what do they mean by border checks? I need a passport to go into Europe and return to the UK. The only difference between my wife and me is that she gets a stamp in her passport and I don't.

We still go through the same customs channels, we still get our bags checked sometimes and in Europe we get no duty free like you used to (actually, that's not strictly true). It just means that I can live anywhere in Europe, as can my wife with her visa and so can they. But our laws vary, our currency varies (we stil have pounds and pence), our languages and cultures vary etc etc etc. Describing europe as one place is like saying I'm going to America and sitting on the beach in Rio.