The UK government has abandoned its plan to revoke all retained EU law (save for any legislation expressly maintained or replaced by UK law) at the end of 2023.
Rather, a targeted list of 600 pieces of EU legislation is expected to be revoked, with all other legislation being retained as the default position.3
The Sunset Clause
The initial proposal, known as the "sunset clause", included in the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill, was introduced into parliament in September 2022.
The bill would have automatically revoked all retained EU law by 31 December 2023 unless ministers specifically replaced or decided to retain them.
The U-turn comes after pressure from opposition parties, as well as certain commentators and businesses, who were concerned about the impact of the sunset clause on the UK economy and leaving possible gaps in the legislative landscape.
Concerns were raised that important legislation could be revoked unintentionally due to the tight time frames placed upon ministers to work through significant volumes of legislation.
Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch acknowledged that the deadline had created "legal uncertainty" for businesses.
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