Legal experts to give evidence on the EU budget to Lords committee
The House of Lords EU Financial Affairs Sub-Committee will tomorrow hear evidence on the implications of Brexit for the UK's contributions to and receipts from the EU budget.
At 10.15am on Wednesday 11 January 2017 the Committee will hear from:
- Rhodri Thompson QC, Matrix Chambers
- Professor Takis Tridimas, Matrix Chambers and Chair of European Law, King's College London.
Questions the Committee is likely to ask include:
- What is the legal status of the 2014–20 Multiannual Financial Framework deal? Is the UK legally committed to paying its full share until 2020 even if Brexit takes place before then?
- To what extent is the UK legally bound to commitments already made and those due to be agreed before Brexit?
- What is the legal background for how pensions for retired EU staff are paid and how could the UK's ongoing liabilities be calculated?
- What are the EU's ‘assets' and does the UK ‘own' a share of them which it could claim on Brexit?
- Are multiannual receipts from the EU, such as already-agreed research or infrastructure funding, likely to continue following Brexit on the same basis as any outstanding UK liabilities? Are they legally guaranteed?
- Is it likely that the UK could ‘buy' access to the single market with continued budgetary contributions, in the same manner as Norway?
- Would it be possible for the UK to remain a shareholder of the European Investment Bank following Brexit?
The House of Lords EU Committee and its six Sub-Committees are conducting a coordinated series of short inquiries looking at the issues that will arise in the forthcoming negotiations on Brexit. Taken as a whole, this programme of work will be the most extensive and thorough parliamentary scrutiny of Brexit.
The evidence session will take place at 10.15am on Wednesday 11 January 2017 in Committee Room 4A of the House of Lords.
