Writing for Law 360, he looks at how the U.K.'s participation in the EU's Justice and Home Affairs measures is subject to a specially negotiated “opt-in” mechanism. Under special protocols to the main EU treaty, the U.K. is not subject to such measures unless it “opts in” to them.
Below is a short excerpt from his article*
Among the many potential impacts of the U.K.'s withdrawal from the EU, the end of the various current arrangements for cooperation in criminal justice, or internal security, matters has attracted relatively little attention in the press. Those involved in such arrangements have raised significant concerns, however, which are only partly met by the recent publication of the 585-page draft withdrawal agreement, or DWA, and the 7-page outline of the political declaration, or OPD, that accompanies it.
Background
By way of background, the U.K.'s participation in the EU's Justice and Home Affairs measures is subject to a specially negotiated “opt-in” mechanism. Under special protocols to the main EU treaty, the U.K. is not subject to such measures unless it “opts in” to them.
Despite some domestic controversy, the U.K. has opted in to most of these measures, notably including the European Arrest Warrant scheme, various databases of information held for the purposes of criminal investigations, joint investigation teams for investigations that concern two or more EU states, and two institutions, Europol and Eurojust, which facilitate cooperation between EU police and prosecutors respectively.
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*This article was first published on the Law 360 website (Published: 17th January 2019).
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