Right, those are exactly mine concerns. I'd at least try to bring my Polish-speaking (to some degree) Grandfather along and emphasize that I am a college student who could possibly go to work in Poland, but still its far from certain.

Anyway, this is what Piotrowski replied:

I'll have to see how much he charges and how he does it (i.e. if say part of the payment is only if he is successful, etc).

 

I searched through this very informative Polish Citizenship thread, and there are a few lawyer's websites mentioned throughout, so I figured I would post all of them in one place, in case anyone is looking for a lawyer:


Ian Charski
http://www.icharsky.com/english.asp

Piotr Staczek
http://staczek.com/en/seat.html

Łukasz Piotrowski
http://www.polishcitizenship.org
Kancelaria adwokacka
0 22 840 40 70 - telefon/fax
00-466, Warszawa, Nowosielecka 14a

Krsztof.Banek
http://citizenship.pl/
banek@whad.pl

Christopher A. Kerosky
http://www.polishcitizenship.net/html/about.html

Roman Wisnieski
http://www.polishcitizenship.pl/

 

There are always different ways of interpreting a Law and obviously the Polish government will choose the interpretation which accommodates to their convenience.

There was exactly the same kind of interpretation in the Italian law for persons which emigrated before the Italian unification of 1861 and the consulates for almost 3 decades were refusing to accept your case unless you had evidence that your ancestor left the territory of Italy after the unification. But in 2005 someone asked the question to the ministry of interior about the situation of those who emigrated before the unification and the answer was that they should also be recognized as Italian citizens not withstanding that they have left before, as long as their death was after the unification date. Since then all consulates in the world accept applications for confirmation of citizenship without questioning the date of emigration.

I think for the Polish Law the situation is almost the same, but so far I haven't seen a case which could make a precedent to change this controversial and unfair interpretation.

I can now see why it was so difficult to find the text of the 1920 Act. It took me more than 5 years to find it. The consulates do not publish this information openly and only make a twisted interpretation of it, of course conducted by the Polish Government.

 

Polish Passport

Hi everyone,

My daughter is talking about working in Madrid for a few months. Does anyone know if a Polish passport will allow free movement for Spain?

I know certain countries like Germany restrict their job market for Polish citizens and require Polish citizens to have a work permit.

Does Spain also restrict Polish citizens?

 

Re: Polish Passport

Spain has canceled all its restrictions to the free movement of salaried workers from the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia. This decision was announced by the President of the Spanish Government in the 3rd Spanish-Polish Summit held 9th March 2006 in Granada. It was and transmitted to the other Member States by the Minister of Labour and Social Affairs in the last meeting of the Employment and Social Policy Council, held in Brussels 10th March 2006. Accordingly with this position, from 1st May 2006, salaried workers from these countries have the same rights as those coming from other Member States.

here is the link:

http://ec.europa.eu/eures/main.jsp?acro ... s=1&step=2

 

I don't know if what you say is going to make a big difference given that the final decision is taken in Warsaw and not in the consulate, but you can try.

I'm not questioning your idea, but why don't you also write to other lawyers, to see their opinions? ( e.g. you can write to all of those listed by curiousgeorge in an earlier post).

 

Re: Polish Passport

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of ... or_workers

Under Free movement rights of nationals of new member states there is a SHOW HIDE button. It tells you what countries are restricted until when.

Hope your daughter has a great time.

 

Re: Spain

Thanks for the info! The only EU countries that don't give Poles the right to work freely are Germany, Austria, Denmark.

Germany, Austria and Denmark aren't exactly on my top list of places anyway...even to visit.

 

Nice link!
Don't forget Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Belgium

 

Admin: Why is this thread still in "Immigration to UK" section rather than a more appropriate section? Maybe I missed something, but could this be corrected?

 

Strange...I had never noticed it! and I've been using it all this years...

 

The admin only recently put it into the UK forum when they "reorganized" the forum about a month ago.

Regardless, Going by the length of Polish Citizenship - Part 1, we are just about due for a Part 3, since Part 2 is now longer than Part 1 was when the admin decided to chop it up.

 

Ya, the change was only recent. Not sure how it could even be confused. My only guess is that it was some type of British slight at Poles moving to UK (which is common and looked down upon). Don't know, but it would be good to have it fixed...

 

Right, that probably wouldn't make much of a difference, but I'd think they'd be a bit less likely to throw me out at least if I could present my case as more than just an attempt coming from a 5th generation immigrant...but yeah that I wouldn't exactly place a bet on that winning anyone over.

That gave me a thought though. If my claim in rejected/unsuccessful, I could always try to have my grandfather acquire citizenship on his own. Speaking Polish and being less of a stretch from those who emigrated (his grandparents) I would imagine he has a better chance than I do. And if granted citizenship I'm pretty sure gaining it for myself would be trivial. Well, trivial beyond probably having to wait a year for all the documentation.

After being distracted by several exams I finally managed to do so. I still haven't heard back from Piotrowski on what the cost might be to represent me. Ideally that means he is considering the logistics of the case to give an accurate answer. Or so I hope.



Thanks curiousgeorge by the way for posting all of those links, and for your advice throughout this thread and the previous one!

 

Yep, the link I gave only has the restrictions for EU countries but Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Belgium are also restricted.

Curiousgeorge do you know when the Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Belgium restriction gets lifted?

 

Hello all...

Just to update you all and warn others in the future about direct-applying. I believe a nearly identicaly situation to curiousgeorge has happened to me. We are the only two on this forum that submitted paperwork directly in Poland. I called today. about 13 or 14 months after mine was submitted. I have been trying to get someone on the phone for a week and a half (calling daily in the AM here, so early after noon there. I finally called and got someone on the phone. Thank God, she spoke English! She then looked me up in the system (they use computers for this, to my honest surprise!) and transferred me to a different extension. That person (another office) did not speak English. I told her in Polish that I was sorry but my Polish wasn't great and asked if she could speak English. From her, unlike the first girl, I got a sigh, the type that means, "not another one of these assholes". Anyway, she actually got out of her chair (I could hear) and went down the hall and yelled if anyone spoke English. Someone came who spoke fluent British English! She gave me my case number, and after a bit of chatting behind the scenes told me that the (here comes the similartiy) person who had been assigned my case quit, so it had been sitting there for a long time, UNdecided, though. She said she just reassigned it to a new person and to call back next Friday, and she was confident there would be an outcome by then. I double-checked, and she said yes, an outcome in about a week.

Cliffs:
-finally got through calling Warsaw office
-got my case number
-my case wasn't decided and the person assigned to it had quit
-told to call back next Friday and should have my outcome by then.
-I become confused after waiting so long how it can be decided in a week more, lol

ANYWAY, I'll let you all know next week what happens, but I'm not getting my hopes up for an outcome in just one week.

 

Unfortunately it doesn't work like that...How is your grandfather going to acquire Polish citizenship on his own bases? ( I mean, if your great-great grandfather cannot transmit it to your great-grandfather,neither can he to your grandfather and so the line is interrupted). Even if he lives in Poland for 5 years and then applies for naturalization as a foreigner on his own right, that would be only for him, and wouldn't have any effect on his descendants, since all his children are already over 16 years old.

 

I'm not saying it will happen, but you might be lucky enough to get it sorted in one week. When my sister called, the file was also waiting for almost two years, and when she got the confirmation certificate, the date of issue I think it was one week or so after she called.

 

According to that link Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Germany, Austria and Denmark will lift their restrictions in 2011.

according to the following link, Belgium will lift them after 30th April 2009 (extensible).

http://ec.europa.eu/eures/main.jsp?acro ... s=1&step=2

 

Right, legally it should be no different for him to apply for citizenship via descent verses me. I was just throwing out the random thought that the consulate might be a little less likely to throw out his case, given that he can speak Polish and actually knew those who emigrated from Poland, than mine. But you're certainly correct that that should make no real difference.