Delighted to have contributed to this piece by @pmdfoster, in the excellent company of @CSBarnard24 and @SirJJQC. ft.com/content/e5a7c9…
Two main points about the current government’s proposals to revisit “retained EU law” (the mass of mainly technical but often important EU law that remains in force in the UK).
1. The somewhat hand-waving, “let’s seem to be doing something Brexity”, suggestion of changing its status vis-a-vis domestic legislation is simply unwise, for the reason well-summarised by Peter.
Post-transition, any new domestic legislation overrides retained EU law. That’s fine.
But Frost’s idea seems to be to go back and (retrospectively) fiddle around with the relationship between retained EU law and domestic law passed while we were still in the EU.
No-one really knows what the legal consequences of that retrospective fiddling around would be. It’s the legal equivalent of a large red button on a spaceship labelled “no one really knows what happens if you push this button”.
Best not to push it, even if you want to show how much you really do now direct the ship.
2. The proposal to widen Ministers’ already generous powers under the Withdrawal Act to legislate to amend or repeal retained EU law as the mood takes them is hard to see as anything more than yet another power grab by the executive.
The Vote Leave claim was that after Brexit the law that we inherited from the EU would be reconsidered carefully and democratically, through our democratic institutions. Legislation by Ministerial fiat with the bare Parliamentary scrutiny given to SIs dishonours that promise.
A great thread to the same effect.
https://twitter.com/sylviademars/status/1438869195291336713
And as @DPhinnemore points out, every divergence from EU law in relation to goods increases divergence between NI and GB.
https://twitter.com/dphinnemore/status/1440990414731988997
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