Brexit and Norway

There has been a long history of British people travelling across the North Sea to work in Norway. The development of the North Sea Oil Industry has been a collaboration between the two countries and skilled people have enjoyed the opportunities this brought.

We won’t spend too long dwelling on what a monumentally stupid thing Brexit is. In many ways the pandemic has masked just how bad Brexit is, but many people are now starting to realise the real implications.

In this piece, we’re focusing on what Brexit means for Norwegian companies that might want to use British workers (especially contractors).

Before Brexit

Until 31/12/2020, British workers had the right to live and work in Norway under the EU/EEA freedom of movement agreement. If we sent people to Norway, we registered them with the Office for Foreign Workers and the Police, got issued a Tax Number (‘D-Number’) and they were fine to start working immediately.

In 2021

Due to the pandemic and uncertainty around how the Brexit agreement would be enforced, Norway gave British workers a ‘period of grace’ until 31/12/2021.

In practice this meant that British workers could start working in Norway immediately, but that the employer needed to apply for a residence permit (cost NOK 6,000). Residence permits were taking between 8 and 12 weeks to be processed.

This meant that Norwegian companies could still quickly get access to British workers, but that the agency/supplier faced extra costs and paperwork to supply them.

In 2022

The ‘period of grace’ ended and now British workers are treated like any other ‘third country’ national. This means that they cannot start working in Norway until they have a residence permit. The current processing time for a residence permit is 15-18 weeks.

This effectively means that, for most contract jobs, it’s impossible to use UK citizens. The added time, cost and paperwork just make it easier to use citizens of EU countries.

EASA Licences

It’s also worth noting that, as part of Brexit, the UK CAA has left EASA. This means that Licensed Engineers with UK CAA Licences can no longer sign for EASA registered aircraft.