Common Travel Area - Can we freely move?

So you can either answer the questions and be on your way, or be the ar$e that "knows his rights", answer like @wandererz suggests above, and provoke more suspicion on yourself and delay yourself further

Not to backseat mod, but this type of response is seen all over boards.ie and it totally ruins discussion.

Maybe....just maybe....the reason the OP has actually posted this is precisely because it is unusual? How can you possibly assert that of the approximately 10,000 UK Border Force personnel, that ONE of them didn't ask the OP this question? It's the most basic question you could ask a traveller.

In any case, I've been asked similar questions multiple times when crossing, but both Irish Customs and UK Border officials. A few times I was travelling on my own as an Irish citizen in a UK reg car, another time with four guys on a road trip, so I/we understandably stand out more than a family on holiday or a truck driver who does the trip every week.

I wouldn't be confident any UK border post is up to speed on what the rules are.

We were entering Britain from Spain and we were both using our Irish Passport Cards, I got though no problem and person checking me said that the UK should have introduced such a card years ago, even showed it to her colleague in her booth. But my wife who went to the next booth was being held up and asked for her real ID. I was waiting a good 10 min before a supervisor confirmed that the UK accepts our Passport Card.

I reckon they're told ask what they like when they like.

It may be the case that they are not entitled to ask you the purpose of your visit but I don't think standing in front of the UK border police is the time to assert your rights. You have to remember that in that situation, you are in no position to be bolshie and awkward because they have all the power and you have virtually none. For example, even if you stand on your rights and refuse to answer a question, they can respond by calling over their friends in HMRC to give your bags (and possibly your person) a good, slow search and ask you lots of customs-related questions. Good luck quoting the CTA to those fellows!

I was pulled over by a few lads in high-vis jackets when about to drive on to the ferry in Holyhead in October last. I had no idea if they were border police or HMRC but we were inside a controlled zone so I knew they were genuine. I could have asserted all sorts of rights and refused to answer some of their questions but what would be the point of that? They were ultra polite and very professional so when they asked me some questions and would it be ok to look in my boot, I was equally polite, answered their questions and was on my way in less than two minutes.

There's a time and a place to assert your rights, doing it while attempting to enter or leave a country is not the time to do it.

But passport checks between Ireland and the Schengen area are routine and to be expected.

Flying into Dublin Airport there is no exemption for CTA passengers (or domestic passengers for that matter) from passing though immigration, so passport or other ID or evidence of domestic flight is required.

FWIW I've never been asked for passport or ID when taking an Irish Sea ferry.

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It’s no so much that they are not allowed to ask so much as once they have identified that the person is a U.K. or Irish citizen, they cannot insist on an answer via a via immigration. If the person is HMRC or police they may ask questions under different codes. However, an Irish citizen is not subject to immigration control on a local journey, ie one between Ireland and the U.K. and cannot be lawfully detained or delayed on immigration grounds once their identity is established. Border Force is generally pretty hot on that point as they too often engage with people trying to force a confrontation. Much easier to give a nod to the Customs officer or police person (money, drugs or, as I was once informed, porn smuggling).

I know. People going on like they have been waterboarded.

Have gone through security checks at Holyhead as long ago as 2003. In 1995 I was stopped by a lone policeman and asked a series of questions at Newcastle airport and yet have landed at Heathrow many times with no security checks at all.

"Stringent checks on visitors from the UK to Ireland" would require a hard border in Ireland — and that's a "no" — or the best you can do is checks on traffic from Great Britain, easily avoided by travelling to Belfast and then crossing the land border.

It is a blind spot for the UK to apply random checks at seaports but not flight arrivals from Ireland. Aerlingus I believe accept an Irish drivers license as ID for boarding so there could be lots of third country nationals entering Britain without an appropriate visa and the Brits would never know.

If there was one high profile case of illegal entry from Ireland via plane i reckon that would be the end of no ID checks for us in British airports.

There are spot checks at U.K. airports for CTA arrivals. Experienced 3 times at Lcy, twice at Gatwick and once at Heathrow.

I was checked once at LBA (last year). That was a first for me.

They don't care what you say, they care about how you say it.

The right of an eu citizen to enter another eu country is not an absolute one.

Countries still retain the right to border checking even within the Schengen zone. Denmark reintroduced border checks although they're officially temporary.

Schengen ultimately is about legal jurisdiction and the sharing of information which reduces the need for but not eliminates border checks between members.

Yeah I'm well aware of that. I was just wondering the point of questioning EU travellers entering the Schengen area. It's not common in my experience.