Impact of EU Membership on UK Law - Article Example

Impact of EU membership on UK Law European Union was formed to create an environment where all European nations could benefit from efficient use of factors of production to provide cost effective products and services for the European people. This entails all member nations to agree to common economic policies. This has far reaching effect not only on the economic policy making of the member countries but also on their political and legal systems. Common policy implementation requires great political integration of the various member states. For the above stated purpose, a European Community was formed which consisted of council of ministers and a setup of various institutions like European Parliament, The Council of European Union, European Commission, the Court of Justice and so on (actrav.itcilo.org). Among the various institutes, the European Commission plays the most important role in the process of policy making. Its main function includes the introduction or origination of the various legislations. It then acts as a “guardian of Treaties” as well as executes and manages the various Union policies along with those of “international trade relations” (actrav.itcilo.org). Thus, through the various institutes, the EC ensures that various legislations are created and followed throughout the European Union community. This has implications for the member states as the laws passed by the EU are binding on all the member countries (blurtit.com). Thus, UK is no exception being a member of the EU. Any law passed by the EU takes precedence over the domestic laws of Britain. This has impact on the sovereignty of the country. UK is a sovereign country owing to the fact that only the British Parliament can make or change laws for the nation. Thus, the Parliament is the ultimate authority for making laws through its elected parliamentarians, which signifies the parliamentary sovereignty of the country. When UK “agreed to pooling some powers and responsibilities of its national government and parliament” for the joining the EU, it agreed to surrender some amount of its sovereignty (blurtit.com). The major policy areas that are specifically impacted are foreign policy, justice and economic policy. This means that if the government of Britain were to consent to a particular treaty of the EU in conjunction with the other member states, the MPs of Britain will have no powers to overthrow it. The European Court has powers to overrule any motion passed by the British parliament to defeat any such treaty. The only way UK could then implement the motion of the British parliamentarians is to withdraw its membership from the EU. How much has been the influence of the EU membership on the laws of UK can be adjudged by looking at the number of legislations or directives that have been passed on account of EU regulations as compared to those initiated locally. It has been estimated that 50% of the UK laws are EU-originated (Johnston 2009). The research also showed that of the 2000 regulatory proposals studied, 72% of the cost of regulations was on account of EU regulations (Johnston 2009). The major worrisome feature of this is that the country is being run more by EU laws than by the local ones and topping on this is the fact that these laws are not very well scrutinized and cannot be easily changed by the elected representatives of the British parliament. Delegated legislation brings another aspect into the UK law scene. Delegated legislation means that the government can make finer changes to a law without having to go through the parliamentary process (parliament.uk). The major advantages of this legislation are that it saves the time of the parliament especially where the MPs do not have specific technical knowledge about the field of the Act, it allows quick decision making especially in situations of national security or health and helps in enabling small changes (sixthformlaw.info). However, the major disadvantages lie in the fact that it is usually passed by the civil servants who are not the elected member of the parliament and hence the democratic process is by passed, the complexity created by the volume of the legislations makes it impossible to keep track and as all types of amendments are not publicized there is lack of public awareness about the various legislations (sixthformlaw.info). Delegated legislations can be used by the government to tweak the various local laws in favor of the EU laws. This would be a very easy way of implementing EU laws without causing much controversy on issues that the government does not want to discuss. The impact of EU laws on UK is even far reaching owing to the fact that EU interacts with the government in many different ways. The government of UK can have an impact on the EU policies based on the type of interaction it has at various levels and the type of decision making procedure used by the EU. Putting simply, the British government tends to be an “implementer of the EU policies only” as its legislations are not debatable in the parliament (Geyer, Mackintosh and Lehmann 2005). If the EU legislation is in the form of a regulation, it has to be implemented without delay and hence the government does not have much say in it (Geyer, Mackintosh and Lehmann 2005). If it is a directive, then the government has some amount of discretion in the way it is implemented, though its implementation is binding on the British government (Geyer, Mackintosh and Lehmann 2005). And finally if it is a recommendation, then its implementation is completely at the discretion of the government (Geyer, Mackintosh and Lehmann 2005). Thus, we can see that the various legislations of the EC impacts British laws depending on the type of law passed. There are many areas in which EC does not have much influence and require a unanimous decision from the member states. Thus, the representatives of the British government can have an influence in such cases. However for decisions that are subject to QMV, like health and safety policy, the commission is the ultimate authority. References actrav.itcilo.org, European Union, viewed on May 26, 2011 http://actrav.itcilo.org/actrav-english/telearn/global/ilo/blokit/eu.htm blurtit.com, What Effect Has The EU Had On Parliamentary Sovereignty In UK And Its Law In General? viewed on May 26, 2011 http://www.blurtit.com/q282192.html Geyer, R, Mackintosh, A and Lehmann, K (2005). Integrating UK and European social policy: the complexity of Europeanisation, Radcliffe Publishing Johnston, P (2009). EU: is Britain still a sovereign state? viewed on May 26, 2011 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/6198513/EU-is-Britain-still-a-sovereign-state.html parliament.uk, Delegated legislation, viewed on May 26, 2011 http://www.parliament.uk/about/how/laws/delegated/ sixthformlaw.info, Sixth Form Law, viewed on May 26, 2011 http://sixthformlaw.info/01_modules/mod2/2_2_1_legislation/18_del_leg_adv_disadv.htm Read More