In September 2021, the Governmentgovernment announced the review into the substance of retained EU law (REUL) to determine which departments, policy areas and sectors of the economy contain the most REUL.
InThe JuneREUL 2022,dashboard theshowcases Government published the initial outcome of this review,review whichand issubsequent intendedfurther towork beby departments as an authoritative catalogue of REUL.
The public areis invited to viewexplore this catalogue into orderbuild toan understandunderstanding whereof how much EU-derived legislation sits on the UK statute book and to take the opportunity to scrutinise this legislation.
Now that we have taken back control of our statute book, the Government is taking a proactive approach to update it by amending, repealing or replacing REUL that is no longer fit for the UK. This will allow us to create a new pro-growth, high standards regulatory framework that gives businesses the confidence to innovate, invest and create jobs.
In terms of next steps, we have brought forward the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill 2022. This Bill will make it easier to amend, repeal or replace REUL to deliver the UK’s regulatory, economic and environmental priorities.
Alongside the Bill, the government will continue to engage with stakeholders to identify where we can maximise the benefits of Brexit and test opportunities for reform, from artificial intelligence and data protection, to the future of transport and health and safety. Any future reforms will prioritise making a tangible difference to improving people’s lives in the UK.
Background
REUL is a category of domestic law created at the end of the transition period. It is made up of certain pieces of direct EU legislation that were ‘cut and pasted’ onto the UK statute book. REUL iscan alsoinclude madelegislation upthat ofis certainprimarily designed to fulfil domestic lawspolicy thatobjectives implementedor other international commitments, where legislation also implements EU law.obligations.
The catalogue of REUL can be accessed via TableauMicrosoft Public,Power BI, which hosts the secondthird iteration of the interactive REUL dashboard. The new data included in this update was collected by departments betweenin JulyApril 2022 and January 2023 as part of an ongoing cross-government collaborative exercise to identify REUL that did not otherwise have a clear departmental owner. This exercise has identified over 1,4,800 000individual additional pieces of REUL in total, which are now present onin the dashboard. This is an increase of approximately 1,080 pieces since the last iteration.
This dashboard provides multiple options to explore and filter overthe 3,700legislation, pieceswhich ofis legislation, concentrated over 400 unique policy areas.
Future updates to the Dashboarddashboard will take place throughout 2023. These will include further previously ‘orphaned’ REUL which has been identified by The National Archives. The first of these additional updates occurred in September 2023, with 77 additional pieces added, all planned for revocation via a statutory instrument to be laid on 4 September 2023. The dashboard now totals 4,994 entries.
This secondcatalogue iterationis ofprovided by the REULUK dashboardgovernment and is therefore not intended to provide aan comprehensiveauthoritative account of REUL in general, nor of REUL that sits with the competence of the Devolveddevolved Governments.governments. ItHowever, it may contain individual pieces of REUL which do sit in devolved areas and it does indicateidentify the territorial extentapplication of individualeach piecespiece of REUL.
Creating and continuing to develop this comprehensive record of EU-derived legislation will enable Governmentthe government to accelerate regulatory reform and reclaim the UK statute book. Going forward, the government will continue to update this catalogue on a quarterly basis as government departments work to identify where more legislation can be amended, repealed or replaced. This dashboard documents the government’s progress against that aim.
For further instructions on using the dashboard please visit the Retained EU Law Dashboarddashboard.