On 19/08/2019 17:12, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 19/08/2019 17:02, nightjar wrote:
....
If that Act is repealed, EU law will cease to have any effect in the
UK, except as permitted by other, later, legislation. Hence, UK law is
and always has been supreme, even if if has granted permission to the
EU to create legislation that it will follow.

THst is where the international law of treaties overrules domestic law,
and where the legal minefield begins

As a soveriegn country the UK has the right to sign international
treaies and ve bound by them irrevocably irrespective of deomestic law
which may seek to oveertride them

It also has te pwoer to unilaterally withdraw from them.

IOW, ultimately domestic law has precedence. It may not sit well with
the international community if a country does decide to withdraw from a
treaty but, as Donald Trump has demonstrated, it is quite possible to
withdraw by means of domestic legislation without any more serious
consequence than other countries condemning the action.

However if a treaty cedes sovereignty, the position is as muddy as hell.

on the one hand, as no longer a sovereign nation, the treaty cannot be
held to be valid. On the other hand as no longer a soverign nation, no
unilteral withdrawal is possible....

It is not possible to cede sovereignty via a treaty. It is, however,
possible to delegate some of the responsibilities that way.

This has been done with EU in respect of secondary legislation. In that,
the EU is in the same position as any Secretary of State; They may issue
Regulations within the scope of enabling legislation, passed by the UK
parliament. If that enabling legislation is withdrawn, the Regulations
cease to have effect, unless they are enshrined into UK law by another
piece of legislation.

EU Directives OTOH do not automatically pass into the law of the member
states. They have to be implemented through national legislation in each
state. States may also choose to implement the Directive in different
ways, subject to keeping certain core elements. For example, when the
Working Hours Directive was introduced, the French made a 35 hour
working week a mandatory maximum for everybody. In the UK, we set 35
hours as the maximum that any employee could be required to work, but
allowed them to work voluntarily up to 48 hours a week.



--
Colin Bignell