The EU Commission is now discussing the possibility of establishing a common asylum policy to prevent "asylum shopping".
BBC News : EU debates 'asylum-shopper' curbs
Indeed, asylum-seekers, immigrants and foreign (= non-EU) visitors or residents to the EU now have the right to stay in all the Schengen area (all EU except UK & Ireland + Norway, Iceland and Switzerland) and if their status allowed them to work, then they can work in all EU-members of the Schengen area.
There is no such as a visa to France, a visa to Sweden, or a visa to Greece anymore. There are only Schengen visas. Nonetheless, visas are still granted by individual member-states, not by the EU (probably because the Schengen area does not coincide exactly with the EU). So someone who wants to live, study or work in a Schengen member-state must apply to one of those countries' embassy.
In practice it does not matter where you apply. So if you want to work in Germany, you could very well apply for a visa at the Spanish embassy. This would be fine if all countries had the same requirements for visa applications, but they do not ! So one can really "shop around" and compare the requirements between member-states, then get a visa where it is easiest.
For instance, in the case of a non-EU citizen married to an EU-citizen, that person could be asked to have been married for at least 1 year in a country while another EU country won't ask for it. In Belgium, someone married to an EU citizen doesn't even need to apply for a visa - they just have to register normally at the town hall. Prices of visas also vary greatly across EU member states.
Unfortunately this state of affairs encourages immigrants to get their visa whereever they can find the best deal. The abberency goes so far that a Japanese citizen entering the EU in Austria or Germany will be granted a 6 months "Schengen visa", but they will only receive 3 months if they land at an airport anywhere else ! So if they want to go backpacking for 5 months around Europe, they really should choose a flight to Germany or Austria, otherwise they will have to leave Europe once to get a new visa !
Not only is this situation aberrant and complicated for foreign tourists, students or business people, it also becomes quite "dangerous" when it comes to economic migrants and asylum seekers. Just imagine, if in the same year 100,000 French-speaking Africans all want to go to France because of the language facility, beauty of the country and high social security, but the French government won't grant more than 5,000 visas, the 95,000 others can still apply for a visa in any of the 22 other EU-Schengen member states, and if they get their visa, they can all go to France ! Result : 100,000 French-speaking Africans in France and none elsewhere that year. Yet it happens. Why would France have over 5 million people from Africa ("officially", as it could be more) while the population and government are mainly against it ?
That is why it is important to create a common visa policy managed by an EU Institution (e.g. Commission of Justice, currently headed by Franco Frattini), with a common database for all EU-Schengen states.
This common database would also permit another very important thing : have a common blacklist of visa-overstayers, illegals, criminals and terrorists (well, there is already such a list for the last two, but by Europol, not immigration services).
BBC News : EU debates 'asylum-shopper' curbs
BBC said:
Indeed, asylum-seekers, immigrants and foreign (= non-EU) visitors or residents to the EU now have the right to stay in all the Schengen area (all EU except UK & Ireland + Norway, Iceland and Switzerland) and if their status allowed them to work, then they can work in all EU-members of the Schengen area.
There is no such as a visa to France, a visa to Sweden, or a visa to Greece anymore. There are only Schengen visas. Nonetheless, visas are still granted by individual member-states, not by the EU (probably because the Schengen area does not coincide exactly with the EU). So someone who wants to live, study or work in a Schengen member-state must apply to one of those countries' embassy.
In practice it does not matter where you apply. So if you want to work in Germany, you could very well apply for a visa at the Spanish embassy. This would be fine if all countries had the same requirements for visa applications, but they do not ! So one can really "shop around" and compare the requirements between member-states, then get a visa where it is easiest.
For instance, in the case of a non-EU citizen married to an EU-citizen, that person could be asked to have been married for at least 1 year in a country while another EU country won't ask for it. In Belgium, someone married to an EU citizen doesn't even need to apply for a visa - they just have to register normally at the town hall. Prices of visas also vary greatly across EU member states.
Unfortunately this state of affairs encourages immigrants to get their visa whereever they can find the best deal. The abberency goes so far that a Japanese citizen entering the EU in Austria or Germany will be granted a 6 months "Schengen visa", but they will only receive 3 months if they land at an airport anywhere else ! So if they want to go backpacking for 5 months around Europe, they really should choose a flight to Germany or Austria, otherwise they will have to leave Europe once to get a new visa !
Not only is this situation aberrant and complicated for foreign tourists, students or business people, it also becomes quite "dangerous" when it comes to economic migrants and asylum seekers. Just imagine, if in the same year 100,000 French-speaking Africans all want to go to France because of the language facility, beauty of the country and high social security, but the French government won't grant more than 5,000 visas, the 95,000 others can still apply for a visa in any of the 22 other EU-Schengen member states, and if they get their visa, they can all go to France ! Result : 100,000 French-speaking Africans in France and none elsewhere that year. Yet it happens. Why would France have over 5 million people from Africa ("officially", as it could be more) while the population and government are mainly against it ?
That is why it is important to create a common visa policy managed by an EU Institution (e.g. Commission of Justice, currently headed by Franco Frattini), with a common database for all EU-Schengen states.
This common database would also permit another very important thing : have a common blacklist of visa-overstayers, illegals, criminals and terrorists (well, there is already such a list for the last two, but by Europol, not immigration services).