EU-UK Relations: There is no Steady State

Summary:

There are many examples of where future EU or UK regulatory objectives are likely to cause tension. Proposed EU rules on foreign subsidies will probably catch UK investors in their net; UK plans to embrace gene editing technologies could lead some EU member-states to push for tougher import controls on British food products. But if tension is inevitable, what matters is how problems are managed and resolved. Are they treated procedurally, contained within the structures and committees of the TCA without putting other aspects of the relationship in question, or do the EU and UK perpetually lurch from crisis to crisis? As the EU and the UK learn to co-exist, economic interdependency will probably stop the relationship breaking down altogether in the near future, but those hoping for a steady state will need to wait a while longer.

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