Absolutely right that governance is a key issue: if the UK agrees to stick to EU standards in return for access (to put it crudely), how is that enforced?
Two issues. One is how to check that the UK is in fact sticking to EU standards where it has agreed to do so. The Commission/ECJ route is objectionable, as the UK will have no say in either.
And the so far preferred Joint Committee route largely pushes that issue one stage back: if there is argument about whether the UK is complying with EU law, that will usually mean deciding what EU law means - which will *always* be reserved to the ECJ.
An obvious answer (if agreement could be obtained) would be to “dock” to the EFTA Court, with a UK judge for UK cases.
Since the EU accepts EFTA Court supervision of the EEA3, there would be no logical objection to that from the EU side (which isn’t to say that there wouldn’t be one).
The UK Government’s lack of interest in this route, and preference for the Joint Committee (and ultimately ECJ) route has always been puzzling.
The second issue is how to deal with the situation where the UK deliberately departs from EU standards, but wants to keep access. That situation can only be resolved by politics. And, ultimately, I suspect, the EU will insist on its right to withdraw access when that happens.
(NB - a lot of simplification in the above.)
