Is leaving the EU leaving the EEA?
This article is a continuation of the last “How to visualise supranational bodies the UK belongs to?”, as it answers now the question raised at the end of it: “Is leaving the EU leaving the EEA?”.
Our analysis is that by leaving the EU, in a no-deal scenario, the UK would get back to existing EEA/EFTA rules, not only on WTO rules.
By letter dated 29 March 2017, the UK withdrew from the EU and European Atomic Energy Community (art 50 TEU). The European Communities Act 1972 will be repealed too but the UK are not currently leaving the EEA (this is done by art. 127), and you don’t apply to treaties/organisations you belong to since 1994.
Maybe the reader will remember that shortly after Miller case 1 followed the case Yalland and Wilding on art 127 EEA, which was judged “premature”; the Court’s reasoning being that it can’t review a decision that was not taken yet.
Therefore, the UK would not leave the EEA and don’t have triggered Art 127 yet. If so, it would require a one-year notice.
This matter is regulated at the UN level with international law (general principles, customs, treaties).
It is important to remember the EU is a Sui Generis legal system based on the principle of conferral of competencies (or sovereign delegation of sovereignty), and not all EU member states are signatories to the Vienna Convention, which therefore doesn’t drive the TCE and TEU.
As often, a visualisation is better to see what would happen.
In the EEA, the UK get back: no customs union; single market kept; freedom to negotiate free trade agreements; keeping the 4 fundamental EU freedoms (goods, capital, persons and services); exit ECJ, EC and Charter on Fundamental rights; much fewer constraints on a few other legal matters.
A good compromise between both Brexit vote and EU wishes?
Thank you for your time and interest.
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