European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill 2017-19
Parliament of the United Kingdom
A Bill to Repeal the European Communities Act 1972 and make other provision in connection with the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the EU.
Territorial extent	England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland (with some extensions)
Legislative history
Bill citation	HC Bill 5 2017-19
Bill published on	13 July 2017
Introduced by	David Davis, Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union
First reading	13 July 2017 (in the House of Commons)
Second reading	7 September 2017 (scheduled) 11 September 2017 (additional date reserved) (in the House of Commons)
White paper	[1] [2]
Related legislation
European Communities Act 1972

The European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, also known as the Repeal Bill or the Great Repeal Bill, is a bill of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that proposes to transpose directly-applicable European Union law into the law of the United Kingdom, as part of the country’s exit from the European Union (Brexit). To implement this, the proposed bill will repeal the European Communities Act 1972 which first brought the UK into what became the EU, incorporate all EU law into the UK statute books, and give ministers the power to adapt and remove laws that are no longer relevant.

The bill was read the first time in the House of Commons on 13 July 2017. The bill has received criticisms from the Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats, the Scottish National Party (SNP) and Plaid Cymru, for giving ministers wide-ranging powers to modify existing legislation, for repealing certain human rights provisions, and for limiting the ability of the devolved governments to independently adapt and retain EU law, and the parties have said that they will oppose the bill as it currently stands, as have the Scottish Government and the Welsh Government.

A white paper published on 30 March 2017 stated three objectives for the proposed Repeal Bill:

In October 2016 the Prime Minister, Theresa May, promised a "Great Repeal Bill", which would repeal the European Communities Act 1972 and restate in UK law all enactments previously in force under EU law. It would smooth the transition by ensuring that all laws remain in force until specifically repealed. On 13 July 2017, David Davis, the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, introduced the bill in the House of Commons. As a government bill, this first reading was pro forma; the first debate will be on the second reading.

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