1/ Some general legal points about the EU/UK agreement on implementation of the N. Ireland protocol.
First, it's not about a trade deal as such, but application of the existing withdrawal agreement - although there may be political links between the two.
First, it's not about a trade deal as such, but application of the existing withdrawal agreement - although there may be political links between the two.
https://twitter.com/pmdfoster/status/1336301505171902464?s=20
2/ The agreement will take the legal form of Joint Committee decisions on aspects of the NI protocol. We'll see the text soon - likely proposals for an EU position (which will have been pre-agreed with the UK) before the Joint Committee (which consists of Gove and Sefcovic)
3/ These decisions will be legally binding. There might be other more informal parts to the agreement too. EU Council (Member States) has to sign off on EU position; European Parliament is informed but doesn't usually vote on measures implementing treaties.
4/ Dropping the offending clauses to the Internal Market Bill and Taxation bill means that: EU will drop its infringement proceedings v UK; fringe Brexity arguments to denounce whole withdrawal agreement are set back; impediment to UK relationship with Pres-elect Biden removed.
5/ Reminder of my prior piece on the internal market bill and the withdrawal agreement - prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/inter…
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
