Legal Report on the WA and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights

As part of the work funded by the ICE project, we are now publishing a detailed legal report on Withdrawal Agreement implementation and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights nearly five years on from the beginning of implementation in 2021.

This is the first time that Withdrawal Agreement implementation in relation to UK nationals in the EU has been analysed in this depth. The legal report:

• Charts the negotiation and drafting of the Withdrawal Agreement and how it mirrors free movement law with important differences.

• Looks at how it relates to the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and how these fundamental rights can be used to support individuals when they enforce their rights.

• Gives an overview of every article of Part Two on Citizens’ Rights of the Withdrawal Agreement covering residence, family reunification, worker and equal treatment rights as well as rights to have qualifications recognised and to pension, healthcare, and other social security rights.

• Brings together not only an overview and links to all of the guidance issued by the EU Commission on the Withdrawal Agreement but also guidance on free movement law and caselaw where relevant to the Withdrawal Agreement.

All of this is backed up by our practical experience of the Withdrawal Agreement negotiations, of its drafting and its implementation, including through the individual and systemic cases that we have worked on across 11 or more countries during the life of the ICE project. We would like to thank all of BiE’s country group volunteer advocates for their work on and sharing of cases during the project, which have been invaluable for the preparation of this report.

Alongside the legal report, we are also publishing an anonymised overview of aggregated case data that we collected and a caselaw spreadsheet, which is a simple database of key caselaw referred to in the legal report as well as relevant caselaw from Your Europe Advice opinions that our volunteer advocates received during the life of the project.

Disclaimer: Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.