The UK Internal Market Bill: Was It Worth Breaking International Law?

As you may be aware, recently there has been a bill pass-through parliament called the ‘Internal Market bill’. This bill has been admitted by Tory MPs to break international law, for example Brandon Lewis, who is the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, told the House of Commons, that it broke international law “in a very specific and limited way”. Due to this being the case, the EU has recently started legal action against the UK. The details of this shall be covered later.

I’m unsure if you’ll find this surprising or not, but there was what could be called a ‘small resistance’ from a group of Tory MPs opposing the bill. During the bill’s first hurdle in parliament, we saw 2 rebellious Tory MPs vote against the bill, but we also had 30 more abstaining from the vote. When it came to the third and final reading of the bill however, we didn’t see any Tory MPs vote in opposition, but we also watched 20 of them not vote, the majority of these were assumed to be abstentions, the most well-known name in this list is Theresa May. Despite this opposition, the bill passed comfortably through the house, with 340 votes to 256. 5 previous prime ministers have publicly criticised this bill. Now the EU has begun legal proceedings against the UK because of the internal market bill. Wanting to give the UK a chance, the EU gave the deadline of the 30th of September for the bill to be amended so it complies with international law. However, Boris Johnson and his government stayed rigid on the fact that he hadn’t done anything wrong and refused to submit and comply with the EU’s demands. 

As the deadline for the transitional period looms nearer, it is clear we need to try to soften the impact of Brexit on the economy and daily life. There have been many deals fantasised about, and it’s clear we must recognise the reality of negotiation deadlock. And on recognition, we need to start looking for ways we can prevent severely negative results to negotiations, but Boris Johnson’s attitude clearly displays his desire to not make compromises, which is crucial in any situation. It seems evident to me that the EU was perfectly reasonable in their requests to ask the UK to instead not break international law. I find it hard to see the perspective where abiding by international law is not sensible, but that seems to be the one held by the government. 

Now we can discuss the purpose of the bill and why it breaks international law. We have already seen the UK and Scottish government clash in the Supreme Court over how powers usually exercised by Brussels will be divided when we reach the looming end of the transition period we are currently in. And this bill has only created stronger opinions on both sides of the argument. With the Scottish government claiming this is a Westminster ‘power grab’. While the UK government’s oppositional claim is that this is ‘the biggest transfer of powers in the history of devolution’. In reality, this issue lies on the sideline to the fundamental problem of the use of these new powers and their implications for future regulations and standards in the UK.

The UK government proposed this bill because they wish to have, what they call, an ‘internal’ market where England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland all participate in a joint market. This, I think most people can agree, is a relatively sensible idea and the devolved nations do agree with that, but in order to explain where their frustration originates from I probably need to explain something. 

Due to a new market being created, it therefore means we will need a new set of regulations and standards at which each product is required to comply with if it wants to be sold. The devolved parliaments and assemblies are already set to have control over certain fields for their own nations, these are areas like food labelling and energy efficiency. But when it comes to more important areas of regulations and standards like food and air quality and animal welfare, there is one big row over who gets the final say. But if any disputes do arrive, which honestly is almost inevitable, in the current proposals they are set to be resolved by an Office for the Internal Market which is supposed to be an independent, third party forum. However, it’s just more power being taken away from them is the stance of the devolved administrations.

The UK government has made it clear that all devolutions will be obliged to accept goods and services from anywhere in the UK, even if they have different local product standards. This would be good for companies across the internal market because it guarantees them a broader market to source items from and also one to sell them in. But there is one serious problem that could be the result from this idea that is of grave concern of many of the devolved administrations. This is that the forced acceptance of goods from anywhere in the UK also means acceptance of the standards set in any one nation, which could theoretically result in standards being dragged down until they reach the lowest common denominator. The Welsh government has already said they foresee a ‘race to the bottom’. While this issue is of grave concern, the idea and implementation of an internal market has been said by experts to be crucial.

Now moving on to the legal aspect. We have already seen a similar story with the EU withdrawal bill, the withdrawal bill was rejected by Members of Scottish Parliament (MSPs) and along with the rejection they attempted to draft new legislation, but it was squashed by the Supreme Court. And due to Scotland’s stance, we could see a future legal contest. The main sticking point is that in the withdrawal agreement Boris Johnson signed, it requires Northern Ireland to continue aligning with EU standards. We will now see that the further the UK drifts away from the single market, the amount of checks on products from the British Isles to Northern Ireland will increase. And UK businesses operating in Northern Ireland will have to be adherent to regulations set in Brussels. 

To be honest, this is probably a sensible policy to keep otherwise standards may lower and that may be slightly annoying for Ireland who are likely to receive Northern Irish products. I’m also aware many people (Brexiteers) would argue that not letting standards being agreed in Westminster is an endangering problem. But with the common sense idea of retaining quality food standards, why is following Brussels such a problem, and surely without Brussels couldn’t they could significantly decrease?

This was the policy Boris Johnson had signed off on within the withdrawal agreement, but now he’s trying to pass this bill, which is effectively what he wished he had signed in to the withdrawal agreement. Under several clauses of the new bill we see powers being transferred to ministers which allow them to override the withdrawal agreement, therefore allowing them freedom to break international law. In my opinion, the Guardian put it perfectly, ‘a legal wrecking ball’.