Sweden<\/a> in November, three years after her husband had died, causing huge distress.<\/p>\nAfter being widowed, Thomas downsized with her dog to an apartment in Hammar\u00f6, which is close to her son and grandchildren, and to her husband\u2019s grave.<\/p>\n
She said she sometimes felt overwhelmed by the distress of what was happening.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is unbelievable at my age to be chucked out after being in a country for so long, when you\u2019ve done absolutely nothing wrong,\u201d Thomas said. \u201cI have no criminal record, no driving penalties, nothing. And I have lived here on my own financial means. I just think nobody has actually looked into this thing. I mean, if it was their family or mother, they wouldn\u2019t like them to be in this situation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Holding back tears, she said: \u201cI am not young, and the idea I would have to come back and forth to visit my son and grandchildren and to visit my husband\u2019s grave here \u2026 it is just horrible when you sit and digest it all.\u201d<\/p>\n
Joyce Thomas and her late husband, Gwynne. Photograph: Joyce Thomas<\/p>\n
Her husband, Gwynne, died in 2023 of cancer. It was on a trip back from the UK in 2022, when they visited their second son in Brighton, that they first learned they should have made a formal application to stay in Sweden after Brexit.<\/p>\n
She said her husband had been meticulous at keeping up with news relevant to British people in Sweden and had taken responsibility for all the administration in their household. She was sure he would have made the Brexit application had he known about it.<\/p>\n
While late applications are permissible under the UK\u2019s withdrawal agreement with the EU, Thomas\u2019s submission was rejected in 2024 as she could not demonstrate \u201creasonable grounds\u201d for applying late. A subsequent application to stay under national immigration laws was also rejected.<\/p>\n
With the help of lawyers who are working pro bono, she is now taking the case to a higher court.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen Gwynne died it was the worst thing. We were married for 55 years; he was my best friend and meant everything to me after all those years. But, you know, it [his death] was an end. This is just unbearable limbo. It is horrible. I am not young. I have already moved from a house to a flat \u2013 and to start moving again and looking for another place? I will be dead by the time I would be settled.\u201d<\/p>\n
The former business secretary Peter Kyle, who is MP for Hove and Portslade, said the case was \u201cdeeply concerning\u201d.<\/p>\n
Sweden also tried to deport Kathleen Poole, seen here in a dementia care home with her son Wayne and daughter-in-law Angelica. Photograph: Angelica Poole<\/p>\n
He told the Guardian: \u201cWhile immigration decisions in Sweden are a matter for the Swedish authorities, I have consistently believed that the rights of UK nationals who exercised free movement rights before Brexit should be treated fairly and with compassion.\u201d<\/p>\n
He urged Sweden to review her case. \u201cI hope the authorities will carefully consider all the circumstances of Mrs Thomas\u2019s case, including her long residence in Sweden, her family connections, and the humanitarian factors involved.\u201d<\/p>\n
The FCDO has also expressed concern, not just about Thomas but about the wider hardline approach taken by Sweden to British people living in the country since before Brexit.<\/p>\n
Data shows that Sweden has the highest number of Brexit-related deportations of Britons of all EU member states. According to Eurostat data, 2,500 British nationals have been ordered to leave the country since Brexit, one-third of the entire number of removal orders issued across the 27-member bloc since Brexit in 2021.<\/p>\n
An FCDO spokesperson said: \u201cWe regularly raise concerns regarding Sweden\u2019s protection of citizens\u2019 rights with both the Swedish authorities and the European Commission, which is responsible for monitoring the implementation and application of citizens\u2019 rights matters in EU member states.\u201d<\/p>\n
Article 18 of the EU-UK withdrawal agreement allows for late applications on \u201creasonable grounds\u201d. But UK government sources said they believed Sweden was \u201ctaking a considerably stricter approach\u201d than others. The result is that \u201cin practice individuals are not likely to have their reasonable grounds accepted\u201d.<\/p>\n
According to the most recent European Commission annual report<\/a> on implementation of the WA, almost 4,000 applicants for post-Brexit residency status in Sweden were refused, out of 14,200 made.<\/p>\nBy contrast, Bulgaria, which has a similar number of applicants at around 16,000, refused just five people, and Belgium, which had 13,000 applicants, refused 605, according to the same report.<\/p>\n
According to FCDO analysis, Sweden\u2019s refusal rate of 27.5% is three times higher than any other member state and considerably higher than the EU average of between 3% and 4%.<\/p>\n
Joyce Thomas, 78, in her garden in August, She is facing removal from Sweden over hardline Brexit policy. Photograph: Felix Andler<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for the Swedish immigration authority, Migrationsverket, said: \u201cIn exceptional circumstances, it is still possible to submit a late application. The applicant must explain in writing why they were unable to apply within the prescribed period. Simply stating that the person was unaware of the requirement to apply is not, in itself, considered a sufficient explanation.\u201d<\/p>\n
The withdrawal agreement also calls for \u201cproportionality\u201d in any decisions to remove residency rights.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe think the proportionality is really hard to see here: that somebody\u2019s life can be upended, simply because they missed a deadline to fill out a form that with no information communicated at all to them,\u201d said Felix Andler, a doctor and friend of the Thomas family who is supporting her.<\/p>\n
This article was amended on 10 August 2026 because an earlier version said that Peter Kyle is the MP for Brighton. In fact he represents the neighbouring constituency of Hove and Portslade.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A 78-year-old British widow who has lived in Sweden for 21 years is fighting deportation from the country…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":733740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-733739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=733739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/733740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=733739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=733739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=733739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}