Tag: brexit

Time for a Little More Time? Post-Brexit Trade Negotiations and the Current Pandemic

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 by Allan F. Tatham, Professor at Facultad de Derecho, Universidad San Pablo CEU

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Background

In the present context of the COVID-19 pandemic, with its impact on the health, economic and social systems of states around the world, it appears somewhat trivial in comparison for the UK and the EU to be still pursuing agreement in the post-Brexit negotiations. On 18 March, the Union published its draft legal agreement for the future EU-UK partnership, in accordance with its 2020 Negotiating Directives and the 2019 Political Declaration of the parties. And while, by then, the UK had not presented a comparable document, its approach to the negotiations had been published on 27 February. From these sources, it would be fair to draw the conclusion that there remain many outstanding issues that need to be discussed and resolved. Among them the maintenance of a “level-playing field” to ensure fair competition and protection of standards; fisheries; financial services; security and police matters; and the role of the Court of Justice of the European Union or another mechanism for resolving disputes under a Comprehensive Free Trade  Agreement (CFTA). Even the negotiating styles are different, with the UK seeming to display a sort of “pick-and-mix” approach – essentially using as precedents different provisions selected from various agreements (that the EU has already concluded with other third countries), collecting them together and then arguing for their inclusion in the CFTA.

Given these real challenges, the onset of the pandemic appeared initially to have caused only ripples on the surface of the negotiations. In fact, the UK desired to portray a “business-as-usual” approach to the negotiations and so to “carry on regardless” with them through video conferencing. Moreover, shortly before he himself was quarantined and hospitalised for the virus, the British Prime Minister Boris Johnson in his daily coronavirus press briefings was continuing to repeat the mantra of sticking to the 31 December deadline. Only with Michel Barnier’s diagnosis with the virus, the need for more officials on both teams to self-isolate and the recognised limitations to video-conferencing, were the negotiations suspended at the end of March 2020.
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Editorial of March 2020

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by Pedro Madeira Froufe, Editor
▪


An “idea of Europe” – on George Steiner and Brexit

The result of the 2016 UK referendum (Brexit) undoubtedly posed a series of questions and triggered a set of concerns that, in a way, were already underlying European collective thinking – rectius, underlined and involved the dynamics of European integration.

Following the Brexit referendum, many considered (or even predicted) the progressive disintegration of the Union, a contagious effect on the rest of integrated Europe, especially in the face of the emergence of outbreaks of nationalist populism in countries such as Italy, Poland, Hungary, Malta, Spain, as well as the strengthening of these political currents in other Member States – with the already traditional Front National in France, besides Holland and Germany.

However, instead of these forecasts, during the entire negotiation period of the exit agreement, until January 31, 2020, the contagion effect occurred in the opposite direction to what these currents (which bet on the breakdown) supposed. There was a political reinforcement of the Member States’ common position to renew the will to maintain and deepen the integration process. In other words, a position with a single voice from all the remaining 27 Member States, so that, in that plan, Brexit represented – despite everything and until now – a factor of strengthening the union around the need, commonly felt, to maintain the “European dream” (expression by George Steiner, in a posthumous interview, published in the newspaper El País, on February 7, 2020). So, being naturally a disastrous mishap, Brexit can also be a positive event. There are thorns that oblige us, at times, to pay more attention – treating it with more care – to the beauty of the rose (because “there are no roses without thorns”!).
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Editorial of February 2020

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by Pedro Madeira Froufe, Editor
Tiago Cabral, master in EU Law - UMinho
▪


You have been my friend. That in itself is a tremendous thing[i]

1. Throughout these last few weeks, the final steps necessary to complete the Brexit process were taken, in Brussels. On the 24th January, the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, signed the historic “Brexit deal”. To make it fully official, two steps remained: a) approval by the European Parliament and; b) approval by a qualified majority in the Council. Regarding the European Parliament, indeed, this Institution gave its stamp to the deal by a fairly large margin of 621 votes in favour, 49 against and 13 abstentions, on the 29th of January. Lastly, on the 30th of January, the Council adopted, by written procedure, the decision necessary to conclude the withdrawal agreement.

2. We had plenty of delays and attempts to take Brexit over the line but this time, according to all signs, it will really happen. A quick search through our archives will show the Reader that we had plenty of opportunities to write about Brexit (and will probably keep writing during the transition period and beyond), but this editorial is, in itself, a moment of closure.
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Editorial of November 2019

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 by Allan F. Tatham, Professor at Facultad de Derecho, Universidad San Pablo CEU

▪


“Does Britain have a great future behind it?”: The stress of Brexit on a (Dis)United Kingdom

Introduction

Whatever the results of the British general election on 12 December 2019, Brexit will have major implications for the populations and governance arrangements of the four nations – England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland – and their continuing membership of the United Kingdom (UK). The present author has already discussed the constitutional implications of a vote to leave the European Union (EU).[i] This discussion instead will briefly highlight how the results of that referendum and the ensuing three years or so have increasingly led two of the smaller “devolved” nations (England makes up over 85% of the UK’s total population of some 66.5 million people) to reassess their position in the UK.

The Brexit referendum itself of June 2016 revealed both inter-nation and intra-nation division. According to the figures,[ii] majorities in England and Wales voted to leave, while most voters in Scotland and Northern Ireland (as well as Gibraltar) opted for remain. Yet even these results are more nuanced than first appear: London also voted to remain as did some other cities (e.g., Bristol, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle) though by differing margins. Moreover recent research[iii] has shown that in Wales, areas with predominantly Welsh-speakers had voted to remain (as did Cardiff) while many of the 21% English-born voters had voted leave. The picture in Northern Ireland was no less complex: there, the nationalist community voted overwhelmingly for remain, while the unionist community voted largely (though much less decisively) for leave.

Northern Ireland

Of the four nations, this is the one most directly affected by Brexit since it will be the only part of the UK with an external border with the EU (Ireland). It is also the only devolved nation, according to the 1998 Good Friday/Belfast Peace Agreement, that has in effect the legal right to secede from the UK, once a referendum has been held. In fact the most intractable issue in the Brexit negotiations has proved to be finding a solution to the Northern Irish trilemma: fulfilling the UK Government’s promise to leave the EU customs union and single market; to preserve British “territorial integrity”; and to continue its commitment to the peace agreement. However, leaving the customs union and single market would have meant the re-imposition a hard (or physical) border between the North and the South of the island of Ireland, entailing checks and customs duties: this represented for all parties a direct threat to the peace agreements. A way forward out of this trilemma was needed in order to avoid (or at least minimise) the immense social and economic dislocation implicit in a no-deal Brexit; this presented the negotiators with an immense task.
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The impact of Brexit on the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union

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by Ana Torres Rego, Master's degree in EU Law of UMinho

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The winning of the campaign “Vote Leave”, in the referendum of 23 June 2016 held with the view to expiry the United Kingdom’s accession Treaty, turned out to be one of the biggest challenges facing the modern history of the European Union.

For its turn, if on the occasion when Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union was invoked in 2016 the earlier speeches of the Britain Prime Minister Theresa May can be summarised as “Brexit means Brexit” – as an answer against free movement of people; in the recent past, the increased awareness of the high cost for all parties involved of a hard Brexit has opened space for dialogue and negotiation.

The change of direction noted from October 2016 to March 2017 is very clear in the formal communication[i] notifying the United Kingdom’s intention to leave the European Union sent by Mrs. May to the European Council. That letter, where concerns related with the state of defence of the EU from security threats are strongly expressed, suggests first and foremost the British willingness to keep a special relation with the European Union in defence and security matters in order to ensure the status of security power for both among the potencies in the international order.
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Editorial of March 2019

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 by Allan F. Tatham, Professor at the Faculty of Law of University CEU San Pablo

▪


“Shindler’s Wish” Fulfilled and More? The Possibilities for Re-enfranchisement of UK nationals and EU citizens in a future People’s Vote on Brexit

Introduction

In the afternoon of 25 February 2019, with just over four weeks to go before the country’s expected withdrawal from the European Union, the UK Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn, finally announced his party’s support for a second referendum on the issue.[1] Having already been passed as a resolution by the Labour Party conference in autumn 2018[2] and supported by the majority of party members,[3] it no doubt took the recent resignations of MPs from the party[4] finally to persuade the widely-regarded Eurosceptic Corbyn to swallow the bitter pill for a People’s Vote (PV) on the Brexit deal, “secured” by the cabinet of Prime Minister Theresa May.[5]

However, within the furore caused by his change of heart still hanging in the air, even if (and, at this stage, it is still a very big “if”) the UK Parliament were to vote in favour of a second popular vote, several points will need to be addressed anew.
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MAY be… MAY be not!

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by Pedro Madeira Froufe, Editor
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We are a short time away from the European Parliament Election. We are also just over two months until the date of the formal implementation of Brexit. If all were going as desirable and planned, the United Kingdom would cease to be a member of the European Union at eleven o’clock of 29th March – if all were going as intended, as it was thought, after the no vote (to stay in the EU) in the referendum. But it is not! In fact, we don’t even know how the European elections will be disputed: with or without British candidates; how many MEPs to elect.

The political standoff in which the UK and the EU are immersed is the result of a classical democratic practise in its original context and dynamics. A national border-limited state, closed in itself and its people (its nationals), follows the idea that it holds a non-influenced sovereignty. Such un-limitedness would mean that nothing beyond its borders matter. Absolutely nothing could interfere with its presence as under this traditional and sovereign-ist political cosmovision nothing exists unless it is subject to the autonomous exercise of such sovereignty. However, the autonomous political decision of ‘disintegrating’ is, as many others, no longer a strictly encircled affair to be kept inside a territorial frame of political national frontiers. Today world’s dynamics is not national nor even inter-national. It is transnational, if not a-national. And rigorously speaking a decision made in an internal referendum never produces effects confined in such frontiers. The political decision made after the referendum is not a British decision and regards only British citizens – it is now clear in practical terms given the standoff we are all immersed in.
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Chronos vs. Brexit: why extending Article 50 and delaying Brexit might not be a feasible solution for the EU

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 by Tiago Cabral, Member of CEDU

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1. If everything goes according to plan, the United Kingdom (UK) is currently set to leave the European Union (EU) on 29 March 2019 at 11.00 p.m. That is the date enshrined on the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 and the British Government has a deal that, in theory, allows the UK to leave in the planned timeframe. Remarkably, the EU has managed to keep an extremely (and surprising) united front regarding the Brexit negotiations. It is noteworthy that the message from the Chairman of the Austrian People’s Party and current Austrian Prime-Minister Sebastian Kurz perfectly mirrors the one expressed by Jean-Claude Juncker or Donald Tusk.

2. However, in the UK nothing is going according to plan for Prime-Minister Theresa May. After the deal was announced and its contents revealed a number of ministers – both brexiters and remainers – resigned from the cabinet. Seizing the opportunity to press for a harder Brexit, Jacob Rees-Mogg, the current chairman of the “European Research Group” (a group of hard-Brexit leaning MPs) started pushing for a vote on May’s leadership of the conservative party and (in practice) premiership. Said attempted failed to get the backing of enough MPs (for now) but could find new breath if the current deal is rejected by parliament. On that note, the current deal is most likely than not to be indeed rejected. About 100 conservative MPs have already stated on record that they would vote against it, and most of the opposition parties (including the DUP that has been keeping the government afloat) promised to do the same. The vote is set to happen on 11 December.
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Editorial of December 2018

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 by Sergio Maia, Managing Editor

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Multiannual financial framework, budgets and elections: is there room for convergence?

Current status of EU politics barely hides that convergence seems more and more dramatic, as the elections next May are rapidly approaching amidst uncertainty, Brexit and national populisms. Despite the signal Emmanuel Macron attempted to send recently by addressing the German Bundestag – the first French president to do so in 18 years – in favour of unity against chaos, there is little doubt that the moment is of euro-tension, somewhat of pre-storm. Italy is (literally) stepping on the European Commission’s budgetary recommendations; Brexit withdrawal agreement conclusion is an incognita on the British side (there is also the preliminary reference on its revocability under appreciation in CJEU); Steve Bannon is trying to fund extremist right-wing candidates for the European Parliament election; Poland is disguising its real commitment to implement CJEU interim measures; new migration rules are not settled, etc.

On top of that, there is an ongoing negotiation for the next multiannual financial framework (MFF) and in parallel proposals for a Eurozone specific budget as of 2021 – which was the underlying pretext for Macron’s speech at the Bundestag. The original idea of the French president was to equip the Eurozone with a separate budget to assist Member States experiencing instabilities in their economies. In other words, it would serve as a sort of debt mutualisation guarantee in critical times. This was only insidiously mentioned in the Meseberg Declaration, but it was mentioned nevertheless. The motivation for this tool was to provide an enhancement of the general balance between European economies so that the different levels of development in the EMU could be compensated for the benefit of Euro (stabilisation, prices) and trade flow in the internal market.
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Brexit and the possibility of “withdrawing the withdrawal”: a hypothetical question?

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 by Alessandra Silveira, Editor

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In case C-621/18, Wightman and others, pending judgment by the ECJ, the request for a preliminary ruling concerns the interpretation of Article 50 TEU. It has been made in proceedings where the opposing Scots parties are Andy Wightman and o., on the one hand, and the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, on the other, raising the question whether it is possible to revoke the notification of the intention of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to withdraw from the European Union. The Court of Session, Inner House, First Division (Scotland), seeks, in essence, to ascertain whether, where a Member State has notified the European Council of its intention to withdraw from the European Union in accordance with Article 50 TEU, EU law permits that Member State to unilaterally revoke its notification before the end of the period of two years referred to in that Article. If so, the referring court is uncertain as to the conditions governing such a revocation and its effects relative to that Member State remaining within the European Union.

The referring court states that, under Section 13 of the EU (Withdrawal) Act 2018, the withdrawal agreement which might be concluded between the United Kingdom and the Union under Article 50(2) TEU, setting out the arrangements for that withdrawal, may be ratified only if that agreement and the framework for the future relationship of the United Kingdom and the European Union has been approved by the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The referring court states that, where the withdrawal agreement is not approved by that Parliament, and if no other proposal is made, the departure of the United Kingdom from the Union will nonetheless take effect as from 29 March 2019. The referring court adds that it is uncertain whether it is possible to revoke the notification unilaterally and to remain within the European Union. That court also states that an answer from the ECJ will clarify the options open to the parliamentarians when they vote on those matters.
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