Lounes case but in opposite direction UK - EEA citizenship

[Tim Dunseath]

Hi,
I have been researching this topic but to no avail and hope i can find more information. This may also become more relevant due to the number of UK citizens that have exercised their freedom of movement rights and have since become citizens of the countries they moved to.

Further to "the case of C165/16 Lounes which found that EU citizens who naturalise as British but retain dual nationality with their original EU state, can retain their free movement rights." How does this work for a UK citizen who moved to an EEA state (in my case Finland) and subsequently naturalised as a citizen of said state?

I wish to travel to the UK with my Non-EU spouse and visit our family in UK on an EEA permit but i can not find any information relating to how this would be applicable because i am a dual citizen of UK and Finland after naturalisation not birth and could only do this by moving here and therefore exercising FOM rights.

I did find this information:
EEA national” means—
(a) a national of an EEA State who is not also a British citizen; or
(b) a national of an EEA State who is also a British citizen and who prior to acquiring British citizenship exercised a right to reside as such a national, in accordance with regulation 14 or 15,

According to part (a) I am not an EEA national but surely part (b) should apply to those of us who have aquired citizenship of an EEA state after exercising freedom of movement.

Left feeling confused and also rejected by UK as I am very Happy with my life in Finland I just want to be able to visit my Home country and family with my Non-EU wife. Hope someone can shed some light on this scenario and maybe some share this predicament.

[Richard W]

Your economic situation or residence history is probably such that the logic of the Surinder Singh judgement should apply to you, i.e. you should not lose rights by having become Finnish.

[Tim Dunseath]

Thanks for thr reply Richard,

This too was what I imagine to apply. Finding actual evidence of this is somehow difficult. Due to this lacj of concrete evidence and a lack of confidence in home office rules and their interpretation of EU regulations it all can become quite overwhelming. We applied for an EEA permit and the reply was that i did not include evidence of my finnish citizenship. In that same reply i was returned my finnish passport witg no right of appeal for my wife.

It was my plan to apply at the boarder in Paris vefore taking Eurostar to UK. It somehiw feels like we will be left at the mercy of whomever is interpreting the rules. Thanks again for your reply and i hope others can add either personla experience or have delved even deeper and found more evidence of a naturalised european citizen from and the Lounes case. It seems the mcarthy case is there to stop the irish/uk applicants and the Lounes case remedies this for continental europeans/uk but not in the opposite direction.

All the best!