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Right to stay in France

Last week my new post-Brexit carte de séjour arrived. This allows me to remain in France for the next ten years.

I’ve blanked out ID information, for security

Now I understand why mug shots of criminals are so menacing. When you are told to look straight ahead, keep your mouth shut and not smile, it is extraordinary how little resemblance there is with the original person – I hope. When I was preparing my dossier in April, I went first to SuperU and then Intermarché, two of our three supermarkets, trying to get a reasonable set of photos. I ended up getting three sets of photos, as the machines kept saying the photos did not conform – without telling me what was wrong. Eventually I decided to risk submitting the least worst.

Another local Englishman, John, received his card on the same day. Neither of us could work out whether the unhelpful formal French required us to do anything or not. After consulting a French friend, we decided to take the risk and have simply taken off our cards and then filed the form.

I’m quite relieved this is all over relatively painlessly. There is a Facebook site for Brits applying for their cartes and an amazing number of having all sorts of problems, the main one being no response at all from the Prefecture. Time is running out: Brits have to have applied for their titre de séjour before the end of next month; not to get a response to your application is understandably worrying.

Meanwhile I continue to read stories of European visitors to the UK being hassled by immigration authorities, and of Europeans currently working in the UK planning to leave. How depressing.

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