Comment by agd

I don't really understand the 'bargaining chip statement'. The UK government has said publicly, privately, and repeatedly that it would like an agreement on EU citizens' rights ASAP and could do it before article 50. The EU rejected this. In addition, no EU country has unilaterally offered British citizens abroad rights. So the UK has not acted worse in this regard than any other EU country. And it has acted better than those that rejected a deal on this earlier than article 50 (i.e. Germany).