(Bloomberg) — The European Union is considering launching more legal proceedings against the UK before the end of the month over violations of the Northern Ireland protocol in the Brexit agreement, according to people familiar with the matter.
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A final decision on timing has not been taken and depends on the parliamentary progress of a bill put forward by the British government to unilaterally disapply parts of the withdrawal terms agreed by Prime Minister Boris Johnson when the UK left the EU, the people said.
The committee stage of the bill is due to begin this week before passing to the House of Lords. The EU restarted legal action last month when the bill was presented. Earlier legal action focused on issues including certification of agri-foods and trade data. The further proceedings may involve customs procedures, the people said.
The new legislation would give British ministers the power to unilaterally rewrite the bulk of the Northern Ireland protocol, which keeps the area in the EU’s single market while creating a customs border with the rest of the UK.
British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said the bill was needed to fix problems with the protocol, while the EU argues that scrapping accords agreed and signed by both sides is a violation of international law. None of the candidates competing to replace Johnson as leader of the Conservative party and prime minister have said they would stop the bill.
Despite signing the withdrawal agreement and the protocol in October 2019, the UK has delayed applying many of the provisions and checks contained in the text in the two years since they entered into force.
Medicines, Paperwork
The EU had long refrained from taking legal action over those violations as the two sides tried for months to hammer out a compromise arrangement. The bloc has put forward a number of proposals to tackle several of the concerns that have been raised, such as the flow of medicines between Britain and Northern Ireland and the volume of paperwork that businesses need to file when moving goods across the Irish sea.
But the British government says those ideas aren’t enough and instead wants to rewrite parts of the agreement, which the EU does not want to renegotiate.
The EU has decided to take a gradual approach in its response to the protocol-breaking legislation but that process could ultimately see parts of the trade deal scrapped. The withdrawal agreement and the protocol were pre-conditions to the trade deal the UK and EU agreed.
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