The House of Commons of the British Parliament adopted in the third and final reading the Brexit bill, now the document is submitted to the House of Lords for consideration.
For the bill on Wednesday evening, 324 parliamentarians voted, against – 295.
The bill on the procedure for the withdrawal of Britain from the EU (EU Withdrawal Bill or Great Repeal Bill, GRB) sets the exact date for Brexit – 23.00 on March 29, 2019.
The document provides for the expulsion of the European Court from the process of preparation and application of laws in the UK, and the planned repeal of the country’s law “On the European Community” of 1972 will put an end to the primacy of European legislation over the British. Which laws will be reviewed will have to be decided by the parliament after the adoption of GRB.
During the debate, several amendments were adopted by law. Parliamentarians insisted on the right to empower themselves to approve the text of the agreement on the conditions for the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the EU. At the same time, the government managed to legislatively fix the time and date of Brexit.
GRB, or the “Bill of abolition” – one of the most important legislative acts in the country in all modern history. It was adopted by the lower house of parliament in the second reading on September 12. During the parliamentary stage that lasted until January 16, parliamentarians drafted a report on the bill, which was submitted to the full membership of the House of Commons. After the presentation of the report, the third reading took place, the vote in which makes the de facto document adopted by the lower house. After approval by the House of Lords, the bill is submitted for approval to the queen, who theoretically can veto. The last time this right was used in the XVIII century.
The bill should be approved before the end of negotiations with the EU. Then it will come into force at the time of Britain’s withdrawal from the EU in March 2019.
The withdrawal of Great Britain from the European Union, the so-called Brexit, is an unprecedented process: earlier, no state left the EU. Secession was carried out by semi-autonomous states, such as French Algeria and Saint Martin (overseas communities of France), as well as Greenland (owned by Denmark). The EU, according to experts, continues to have an economic impact on Greenland.
– Next step –
In the course of the implementation of the GRB, parliamentarians will have to review hundreds, if not thousands, of European laws and understand which of them and how should be changed into national ones, which ones to cancel, and what new laws to introduce. Political scientists note that parliamentarians will have so much work in the next two years with this bill that they can hardly do something else in parallel. According to the library of the House of Commons of the British Parliament, currently in Britain there are 19 thousand EU legislative norms.
The problem is that there are thousands of EU laws now in force in the country, and asking the parliament to consider each of them will mean tens of years of work for legislators. To ensure legal certainty on the day after the country leaves the EU, the British government as an initial step will actually simply assess the current EU legislation and “transfer” it to the British legal system.
Thus, at the initial stage it is a question of “renaming” the legislation: those EU norms that suit the British government will become part of the national British legislation.
– Who are the judges? –
To analyze the legal norms of the EU, which the government plans to maintain after the withdrawal from the European Union, a special committee will be created in the British parliament, RIA Novosti reported earlier that two high-ranking parliamentary sources.
“In connection with the government’s plans to keep part of the EU regulations in Britain after Brexit, it is necessary to carefully study what laws can be transformed into British ones. An agency (within the parliament) is required to recommend which norms should be abolished, what are accepted and which (for use in Britain.) These recommendations should be transferred from the special committee to profile committees, and then discussed by the full composition of the House of Commons,” the source said.
He acknowledged that “a tremendous amount of work” is before the parliamentarians, but it is necessary to carefully consider all the rules to avoid cases when in Britain there will be no law, the European analogue of which was in effect before the EU exit, or the law will keep unacceptable provisions for London, introduced earlier by the EU.
“The new committee should have all the authority to recommend making specific changes to the legal norms and their projects, as well as recommend stopping the rules or rewriting them,” the source added.
Another parliamentary source confirmed plans to establish such a special committee and also stated the importance of its creation.
“The preparatory work is done, everything is ready, we need to start working faster.” The new laws will not come into force until they are considered by this committee and approved by the general staff of the Chamber, “he told RIA Novosti.
According to him, parliamentarians also urge the government to comply with the schedule for drafting legislation and submitting proposals to parliament.
