Zuid-Europa twijfelt over Roemeense en Bulgaarse werknemers (en)

Italy is hesitating whether to let in Romanian and Bulgarian workers from January or follow the UK and Ireland in curbing immigration from the EU's two newest member states.

Speaking at a conference on migration on Wednesday (25 October), Italian prime minister Romano Prodi said "We will examine this issue closely, because the Romanians make up the biggest foreign community in Italy."

"I have supported an open door policy but this case is complicated as many European countries have announced that they will not grant free access to Romanian workers. We will try to solve this problem with other EU countries," he added.

Rome's decision on the matter could also influence Spain and Greece, the two other main destinations historically-speaking for Romanian and Bulgarian jobseekers.

All three countries have recently joined the liberal camp of countries that apply no labour restrictions to workers from the eight member states in central and eastern Europe that joined the EU in 2004.

Free movement of workers - one of the fundamental principles of the union - was originally applied by the UK, Ireland and Sweden only with respect to the 2004 new members states, even though Finland, Portugal, Italy, Spain and Greece later joined in.

Other western European countries have kept up their "transitional" barriers, which could in some cases - mainly in Germany and Austria - remain in place until 2011.

But with the new round of enlargement looming and after hundreds of thousands of migrants coming from the 2004 accession states, Britain and Ireland have shifted position and introduced caps on unskilled jobseekers.

All EU member states must inform the European Commission by the end of this year whether they will impose labour barriers against Bulgaria and Romania.

The temporary limits can be applied for a maximum of seven years and can not be applied "in hindsight" after the 1 January 2007 deadline.

Practical implications

While London and Dublin's shift has political implications for the two traditionally pro-free market states, any restrictions in southern Europe could have more direct, practical implications for workers from the two Black Sea countries.

According to a report by the European Citizen Action Service published in September, Romanian economic migrants tend to travel primarily to Italy (29%) and Spain (22%) while Bulgarians have formed the largest immigrant communities in Greece (200,000), Italy (60,000) and Spain (80,000).

Experts say the numbers of irregular migrants are even higher than official statistics, with the country preferences determined by geographic distance as well as language similarities.

As in the case of 2004 enlargement economic migrants, jobseekers from Romania and Bulgaria are generally young and single and usually work in farms, hotels or restaurants.

Since 2004, Italy has mainly received Polish workers, with over 24,000 coming in 2005 mainly for seasonal work. Other economic migrants to the country included Romanians, Albanians and Moroccans.

Spain reported that from the 235,000 or so European migrants since 2004, 11,000 came from central and eastern Europe, mainly Poles and Lithuanians, while non-EU workers mainly came from Ecuador, Morocco and Romania (about 400,000 in total).

Greece and Portugal saw similar trends - with Athens claiming around 4,000 eastern EU newcomers seeking jobs after 2004, while Lisbon said around 1,100 migrants have shown up.