Passport rift between UK and Spain leaves Gibraltar in limbo

Gibraltar is stuck in post-Brexit limbo with the UK and Spain at loggerheads over who should check the passports of people arriving at the British enclave’s airport.

After more than a year of gruelling talks on Gibraltar’s status, tensions are running high over an issue that has huge implications for the Rock’s economy.

The UK and Spain, which is allied with the EU in the talks, are seeking to define the territory’s relationship with the bloc and enable people to cross the land border between Gibraltar and Spain with few or no controls.

Madrid insists that the price must be passport checks by Spanish police at its airport and port, but the UK is firmly opposed to Spanish “boots on the ground”, according to people involved in the talks.

If they cannot reach a deal the land border could be gummed up by full checks on the 30,000 people who cross it every day, jeopardising Gibraltar’s economy by hindering the Spanish workers who fill roughly half of its jobs.

“To have fluidity of movement between Gibraltar and Spain there have to be Schengen controls at the airport,” said a Spanish official involved in the talks, referring to entry into the EU’s Schengen free travel zone.

“There is no doubt. It is the only way. The passport checks have to be done by the Policía Nacional,” the official said, naming Spanish law enforcement.

Under a temporary deal the UK and Spain reached at the end of 2020, most people currently crossing in to or out of Gibraltar are waved through by border officials having flashed their passports or identity cards.

British diplomats say they accept letting the EU check passports at the airport following Brexit but that it should be done by Frontex, the EU border agency, rather than Spanish agents.

The UK’s opposition in part reflects an aversion to Spanish officialdom among many Gibraltarians, which British diplomats link to Spain’s perceived harsh treatment of the Mediterranean outpost in the past.

London is eager to resolve Gibraltar as another post-Brexit issue having sealed a trade agreement for Northern Ireland with the EU last month. The urgency to strike a deal is rising. If Spain’s conservative People’s party wins a general election at the end of this year it could become harder to reach an accord.

After a meeting this week, the UK foreign secretary James Cleverly and Fabian Picardo, Gibraltar’s first minister, said that “robust plans” needed to be in place for all eventualities including a “non-negotiated” outcome.

Cleverly and Picardo “recalled the need to respect the balance achieved” by the temporary UK-Spain deal of 2020. One UK official said there was some frustration in London that Spain appeared to be changing the nature of its demands.

Spain insists it is not making any special requests but merely following the norms of the Schengen zone. “We have asked for nothing. It was the UK that voted for Brexit, which is a legitimate decision,” the official said.

As an alternative to Spanish checks at Gibraltar airport, British diplomats have suggested Spanish border guards could process travellers flying to the enclave at the UK airports where they depart, as the French do in London for Eurostar trains to Paris and Brussels. Airport checks are currently done by Gibraltar’s own border agency.

Another unresolved issue is the status of the airport itself, which is on a Royal Air Force base. Spain would like to have some use of it but Gibraltar opposes the idea, fearing encroachment on British sovereignty.

Gibraltar remains scarred by the memory of how the land border was closed by the Spanish dictator Francisco Franco in 1969 and did not fully reopen until 1985.

In 2013 a spat erupted after Gibraltar began work on an artificial reef in waters that Spain claims as its own and Spain then tightened border controls, leading to waiting times of several hours that infuriated locals on both sides.

In addition to Spanish workers crossing the border, Gibraltarians travel to Spain to shop and spend leisure time on the country’s beaches and golf courses.

If the talks remain deadlocked the UK fears that Spain could introduce more stringent checks again.

The two sides struck the temporary deal in 2020 after Gibraltar was left out of a post-Brexit EU-UK trade deal earlier that year. They are now seeking to agree an EU treaty but José Manuel Albares, Spain’s foreign minister, said last December that his country could not negotiate “eternally” with the UK.

The countries are not debating their diametrically opposed views on the sovereignty of Gibraltar, which Spain ceded to the British crown in 1713. London says it must remain British and Madrid refuses to recognise the UK’s claim.