EU Referendum
Experts in The Dickson Poon School of Law have been examining and commenting on various topics related to the EU Referendum. Highlights of research and commentary from the School are featured below.
Centre of European Law
Professor Takis Tridimas on BBC News.
Podcast: EU Referendum: Explaining the legal challenge to Brexit
Professor Alexander Türk explains how the legal challenge to Brexit works, what the key arguments are, and discusses the likely outcomes and their political implications. Does the Government have the legal right to trigger Article 50?
Updated 24 June 2016: See 'King's Experts React to the EU Referendum'
In the media (pre EU Ref result)
Professor Sir Francis Jacobs, President of the Centre of European Law, was interviewed on the Today programme on BBC Radio Four and said ‘EU Law must remain sovereign for the EU to function properly'.
Professor Takis Tridimas, Director of the Centre of European Law, discussed the UK’s EU membership renegotiations on BBC News. ‘At the moment we have a draft agreement which needs to be approved by the representative of the other members of state,’ he said. On the question of whether David Cameron's EU deal is legally binding, Professor Tridimas, in an interview with BBC News, said: 'Ultimately, the precise interpretation and effect of the UK's arrangements will be subject to the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice. However, it would be inconceivable for the European Court to ignore a binding commitment by all member states which has been endorsed by a popular referendum.'
Speaking to The Independent, Professor Alexander Türk said: 'The ECJ would have to think very long and hard to overturn an arrangement which has been agreed over many months in a difficult political situation. The Court would have to be convinced this is worth derailing.'
Emeritus Professsor Richard Whish has written for Oxford Journals on Brexit and EU Competition Policy.
Britain Alone: conference and book
World leading academics and practitioners in the field of European Law came together at Senate House on Europe Day (9 May 2014) to debate the relationship between EU law and the United Kingdom and explore legal challenges facing the EU.
Britain Alone - edited by Professor Patrick J Birkinshaw and Professor Andrea Biondi (King's) - brings together the outputs from the conference on Brexit. In it, scholars of British constitutional law and EU law discuss such factors as the impact of EU membership on the UK constitution and the perspectives of the UK’s constituent regions, along with numerous practical issues of economics and administration.
Seminars and engagement with the legal community
Professor Maleiha Malik will deliver the keynote lecture at the 'Strengthening the effectiveness of European Equal Treatment Legislation' Equinet conference on Thursday 16 June in Brussels. 'Membership of EU has secured key rights to equality for women, LGBT, disability, young and elderly' she says.
Professor Tridimas has been actively involved in events on Brexit organised by academic institutions and other fora. These include a talk on ‘Should the UK leave the EU?’ presentation to the University of London Legal Forum, 18 December 2016; A talk in a panel discussion on The EU Referendum and its Impact on Legal Relationships, organised by the Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law and the Financial Markets Law Committee, at the Bank of England on 3 March 2016 (for a summary of the event, see here); chairing a debate ‘Deal or No Deal? organised jointly by the Centre of European Law and Matrix Chambers (Holborn Bars, 3 March 2016).
Forthcoming events include The EU debate – le crunch a debate between Patricia McKenna MEP and Takis Tridimas, organised by Conway Hall on 12 June 2016 and a debate among Professor Carol Harlow, Rhodri Thompson QC and Professor Tridimas organised by Matrix chambers on 14 June.
Post referendum: What comes next?
A lively post-referendum debate is already promised. Professor Tridimas has been invited to address the 2016 annual conference of the Constitutional and Administrative Law Bar Association on the relationship between the UK and the EU. The conference is scheduled to take place at St John’s College, Cambridge on 24-25 July. He will also give a seminar on the UK and the EU in the Faculty of Law, University of Jena, Germany, on 6 July 2016.
King’s Student Law Review EU Law Blog
PhD students in The Dickson Poon School of Law run an EU Law blog. Student-run and student-led, it accepts submissions for review from researchers from around the world.
The blog’s recent series explores the implications for the EU referendum and the possibility of Britain leaving the EU. The articles published address: Ireland’s experience with referendums on EU matters, how other Union members and the USA view ‘Brexit’, the legal technicalities of the referendum which are causing arguments between the ‘In’ and ‘Out’ camps and a review of the new book Britain Alone: The Implications and Consequences of the UK Exit from the EU.
Read all the articles in full on the EU Law blog.
Further information
You can find out more about expertise from academics working in other areas of King’s on the university’s EU Referendum experts’ page.