THE European Commission has announced it will take the UK Government to court in two separate cases relating to its behaviour post-Brexit.
On Monday, the EU body said it would take the UK to the Court of Justice of the European Union over European citizens’ rights under the Withdrawal Agreement.
EU law gives EU citizens and their families the right to live, work, and move freely across EU countries. The UK was supposed to respect these rights for EU citizens who were already living there at the end of 2020, but instead limited who could benefit from them.
The second case relates to Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs) that the UK still has in force with six EU nations: Bulgaria, Czechia, Croatia, Lithuania, Poland and Slovenia.
These investment deals, which were created while the UK was in the EU, go against EU laws.
The UK is no longer under the jurisdiction of the EU Court of Justice in most cases, but there are instances, such as under the Withdrawal Agreement and the Northern Ireland Protocol, where it remains so.
In the first case, the European Commission said that UK legislation has “limited the scope of beneficiaries of EU free movement law”.
It said: “After carefully assessing the replies of the United Kingdom, the Commission maintains that several elements of the grievances remain unaddressed, including on the rights of workers and the rights of extended family members. The Commission, therefore, decided to refer the United Kingdom to the Court of Justice of the European Union.”
In the second case, the Commission cited case law which states that “any member state maintaining an intra-EU bilateral investment treaty violates EU law”.
“Therefore, the BITs that the United Kingdom still has in place are against EU law,” it said.
“The Commission liaised with both the United Kingdom and Member States which still had BITs in force with it, in order to facilitate the termination of those BITs in an orderly manner. The United Kingdom, however, failed to terminate the BITs in question until today [Monday, December 16].”
A UK Government spokesperson said: "These cases relate to issues from when the UK was an EU member state and during the transition period. We are not going to comment further on legal proceedings.
"We remain focused on working to reset our relationship with the EU and to make Brexit work for the British people."
