The Prime Minister has now officially requested an extension of the Brexit deadline to 30 June 2019 to enable her to bring the negotiated withdrawal deal (the legally binding Withdrawal Agreement and the Political Declaration on future relations) back to Parliament for a third ‘Meaningful Vote’. … Read more

The Prime Minister has now officially requested an extension of the Brexit deadline to 30 June 2019 to enable her to bring the negotiated withdrawal deal (the legally binding Withdrawal Agreement and the Political Declaration on future relations) back to Parliament for… Read more

International law and Geoffrey Cox QC MP, the UK Government's Attorney General, burst onto centre stage this week as both became central to the UK Government's ongoing attempts to get its Brexit deal through the House of Commons. ... Read more

With just 15 days to go until Brexit, this week's events in the UK Parliament may well be crucial in setting the future direction for the UK's relationship with the EU.  To try to make sense of the ongoing political… Read more

A group of individuals (together named the Belfast Agreement Defence Group) have foreshadowed a judicial review in the High Court of England & Wales (Administrative Court). The challenge would seek an alternative to the Irish backstop protocol as provided for… Read more

In this View from Brussels we discuss how EU law could be used by the UK to improve the Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration along the lines recently requested by the UK Parliament. The backstop, if triggered, starts to apply… Read more

Without an intervening event, the UK will withdraw from the EU at 11pm on 29 March 2019.   Otherwise much remains unknown. The negotiated withdrawal deal comprising a legally binding Withdrawal Agreement and non-binding Political Declaration is facing significant opposition in… Read more

The European Commission has announced that it has started implementing its Brexit “no deal” Contingency Action Plan given the continuing uncertainty regarding ratification of the Withdrawal Agreement in the UK. This follows the Commission's communication of 13 November 2018 which… Read more

The European Commission has announced that it has started implementing its Brexit “no deal” Contingency Action Plan given the continuing uncertainty regarding ratification of the Withdrawal Agreement in the UK.  This follows the Commission's communication of 13 November 2018 which… Read more

The post below was first published on our PIL blog  In a landmark decision delivered on an accelerated timetable, the Court of Justice of the European Union ("CJEU") has ruled that a Member State can unilaterally revoke its notice of intention to… Read more

The negotiated withdrawal deal comprising a legally binding Withdrawal Agreement and a Political Declaration on future relations is facing significant opposition in the UK and is now unlikely to be submitted for parliamentary approval before January. The situation is confused… Read more

With ongoing uncertainty regarding the UK Parliament's acceptance or rejection of the Withdrawal Agreement and the Political Declaration on the future relationship between the UK and EU, both endorsed by the EU Council on 25 November 2018, we have updated… Read more

In the latest update to our Brexit series on the Herbert Smith Freehills Podcast channel Christopher Hunt and Michael McErlaine discuss the Withdrawal Agreement and the Political Declaration released in the past weeks, the next steps to avoid a no-deal Brexit scenario and the impact on companies in Asia and… Read more

The Court of Justice of the European Union ("CJEU") has now ruled that a Member State is free to unilaterally revoke its notice of intention to withdraw from the European Union under Article 50 of the Treaty of the European… Read more

On 22 November the 41st FA Mann Lecture was delivered by the Rt Hon Dominic Grieve QC MP, speaking on the issue: “Brexit - endgame of international engagement or a new start?”  In the Lecture Mr Grieve observed that while… Read more

Advocate General Campos Sánchez-Bordona has advised that Article 50 of the Treaty of the European Union ("TEU") allows for the unilateral revocation of the notification of the intention to withdraw from the EU, meaning that the UK should be able… Read more

On our 28 November 2018 Brexit webinar, we were delighted to be joined by Daniel Finkelstein OBE to share with us his thoughts on the current status of the Brexit negotiations.  Daniel is an Associate Editor and weekly columnist for… Read more

The post below was first published on our Litigation blog Over the past couple of weeks, the government has published the final text of the draft Withdrawal Agreement setting out the arrangements for the UK’s withdrawal from the EU on 29 March… Read more

The UK Government has released a number of documents that aim to aid understanding of the Withdrawal Agreement and the Political Declaration on the future relationship and support parliamentary assessment of the deal. These materials have also been laid before… Read more

During the special summit held on 25 November 2018 the European Council has approved the text of the Withdrawal Agreement and the Political Declaration on the future UK-EU relationship, released on 14 November 2018 and 22 November 2018, respectively. Now… Read more

The long awaited draft Political Declaration on the future relationship between the EU and the UK which will "accompany" the draft Withdrawal Agreement has now been published. We need to point out that it needs to be read together with the… Read more

A draft version of the full Political Declaration on the framework for the future relationship between the UK and the EU, agreed at negotiators’ level and agreed in principle at political level, has just been published and is available here. With a… Read more

On financial services, the final political declaration contains essentially the same three points as in last week's outline political declaration (the implications of which were discussed in our blog post of 15 November, available here), although there is some limited… Read more

Updated*: Official version of the final draft of the Political Declaration on the Future UK-EU relationship has been published by the UK Government here. The texts of the final draft document and the leaked version released earlier are identical. A… Read more

The post below was first published on our PIL blog The 41st of a series of annual lectures in honour of the late Dr FA Mann QC (Hon) (1907-1991) will take place tomorrow in London. This series of lectures, arranged… Read more

In today's webinar Paul Butcher, Brexit Director at Herbert Smith Freehills, was joined by Eric White, Consultant (International Trade) and Katherine Dillon, Of Counsel (Financial Services), both from Herbert Smith Freehills, and Oliver Lewis, Director at Hanbury Strategy, to comment on… Read more

The UK Government released today explanatory slides on the Withdrawal Agreement and the outline political declaration on the future relationship between the UK and the EU following their publication last Wednesday. The slides are available here.   Read more

Following a UK Cabinet meeting yesterday afternoon the UK Government has announced support for the text of a draft Withdrawal Agreement and an outline of the Political Declaration on the Future Relationship agreed with EU negotiators. The Withdrawal Agreement sets… Read more