Professor Rick Rawlings quoted in House of Lords report on EU Withdrawal Bill

Professor Rick Rawlings, Professor of Public Law at UCL Faculty of Laws, is quoted at length in a critical report on the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill published today by the House of Lords Constitution Committee.

In giving evidence to the Committee on the devolution aspects, Professor Rawlings said:

'When clause 11 is put together with the future trumping by Parliamentary Sovereignty of retained EU law, and more particularly with the central capacities to add to, or otherwise modify, that newly classified body of law, the scale of the potential shift in the constitutional balance as between the three Celtic lands and the UK Government and government of

England is made apparent. At one and the same time, Westminster and Whitehall are freed up to shape a post-Brexit world in crucial respects, and the devolved institutions are locked down and required to wait for partial release. However nicely dressed up, this is formal recentralisation of power and exercise of constitutional hierarchy in spades … the dry and technical language cannot disguise the constitutional and political significance of proposals pursued in the name of legal certainty and continuity.'

Professor Rawlings has also given evidence on the Bill to: 

• The House of Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee 
• The House of Commons Welsh Affairs Committee 
• The Scottish Parliament's Finance and Constitution Committee

Read the full report on the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill