The UK EU referendum and the move towards Brexit

After the referendum in June 2016, both the EU and the UK were plunged into political turmoil. The withdrawal procedure must be triggered by the UK government, in accordance with the UK’s constitutional requirements. The judiciary has consequently faced questions whether the government could use the royal prerogative and the status of the devolved legislatures in the context of triggering Brexit. The Supreme Court confirmed that the UK government cannot trigger Article 50 TEU without an authorizing Act of Parliament. On the role of the devolved legislatures, the Supreme Court ruled that these do not have a veto on the UK’s decision to withdraw from the EU. The UK now needs to decide what it wants to achieve in the negotiations for its future relationship with the EU. In this article, a few models are explored. Although it currently seems that the UK government is leaning towards a ‘hard’ or ‘clean’ Brexit, a deeper analysis of the options reveals that there is no easy answer to the question of what the new EU–UK relationship will be like. The purpose of this article is to analyse the options available to the UK rather than to advocate any one particular model.