Johnson hints that UK may drop labour protections
Johnson hints that UK may drop labour protections
News brief - 03/02/20 View this email in your browser
Johnson hints that UK may drop labour protections
Following the UK's official departure from the EU on Friday (31 January 2020), the government has begun setting out its goals for a new Free Trade Agreement with the bloc.
Speaking today, in one of his first post-Brexit statements on the UK's future relationship with the EU, Prime Minister Boris Johnson made it clear that he will not seek alignment with the EU on labour standards, any other social protections, or environmental regulations.
"There is no need for a free trade agreement to involve accepting EU rules on competition policy, subsidies, social protection, the environment, or anything similar any more than the EU should be obliged to accept UK rules," he said.
His words will add to concerns that the Conservative government will seek to erode workers' rights now that the floor of EU laws has been removed. The possibilities for the degredation of employment law were detailed by Professor Nicola Countouris and Professor Keith Ewing, President of the IER, in the free report Brexit and Workers' Rights, and later in an additional briefing on Johnson's Withdrawal Agreement. The authors warned that among the amendments made by Johnson to May's deal - which accounted for less than 5% of the agreement - clauses protecting workers' rights and ostensibly aiming for a level playing field had been cut, thereby allowing the government to "reserve the right" to dilute labour standards.
Shortly afterwards, a leaked government document confirming the removal of workers' rights provision from the Withdrawal Agreement was described by the BBC as evidence that lowering labour standards was "a key part of the renegotiation".
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