Filenews 28 December 2020 - by Theano Thiopoulou
After a nine-month thriller and while it all seemed like there would be no deal, Britain and the European Union gave hands on Brexit.
After leaving the EU on 31 January 2020, following a referendum, the UK entered a transition period in which virtually all EU rules and regulations were in force. The transitional period will end in the morning of 31 December 2020 to 1 January 2021.
The trade agreement on the future relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union from 1 January 2021 is 2,000 pages long and contains provisions on various issues. Specifically: There will be mutual recognition of reliable trade programmes.
Duties
Tariff-free and quota-free access to one of the world's largest markets is the backbone of the Brexit deal and goes beyond EU agreements with Canada or Japan.
Trade
There will be mutual recognition of reliable trade programmes. This means that UK producers will have to comply with both UK and EU standards.
Professional qualifications
There will no longer be automatic identification for doctors, nurses, architects, dentists, pharmacists, veterinarians, engineers. They should seek recognition from 2021 in the Member State in which they wish to pursue their profession.
Work area
Staff seconded to the EU for professional reasons may remain for up to three years if they are managers and qualified and up to one year for trainee staff. Those in a short-term business will need a work permit and can stay for up to 90 days in any 12-month period.
Experts have warned that British business travellers and posted workers - those who stay in the EU to work for a limited period of time - face fines unless they receive advance leave once the UK leaves the single market.
According to the agreement, reciprocal arrangements have been made 'to facilitate short-term business travel and temporary postings of highly skilled workers'.
Those wishing to work in Britain in 2021 should have a temporary residence permit. A allocation system is also provided for stakeholders based on their skills, knowledge, studies and experience. The system includes a category of visas for skilled labour, with special conditions such as job offer and a minimum wage of around ONLY if it is at least EUR 28k per year.
Mobility
UK nationals no longer have the freedom to work, study, start a business or live in the EU and vice versa. A visa will be required for stays in the country for more than 90 days. There will be coordination of certain social security benefits such as old-age pensions and health care to facilitate work abroad while insured persons will not lose any pre-existing concentration of contributions to their national insurance.
State aid
The EU insisted on the UK aligning itself with state aid rules. With the agreement the UK will create its own subsidy scheme ensuring that it respects the basic principles set out in the Treaty. The Agreement also allows both parties to take corrective measures if there are indications that the internal enforcement body has not complied with the common principles.
Level playing field
Both sides agreed on a minimum level of environmental, social and labour standards below which neither should fall. The agreement provides for a review and 'rebalancing' clause, which allows each side to initiate a formal review of the economic parts of the agreement, including the minimum level of standards.
Dispute resolution
If either Party believes that trade is distorted, it may take measures after consultation. An arbitration panel will meet within 30 days and decide whether the measures are considered incorrect or excessive.
It also appears that there will be some sort of UK-EU general governance committee that will have subcommittees to implement and enforce the treaty.
This was one of the most difficult areas of negotiation, as it will resolve trade disputes for decades to come.
The EU was concerned that the UK could, over time and depending on which government was in power, deviate so much from EU standards that it could create a significant competitive advantage and become a "Singapore on the Thames."
Television services
France successfully kept the audiovisual sector out of the agreement, dealing a major blow to the UK, which hosts around 1,400 broadcasters, and around 30% of all channels in the EU.
Britain's thriving tv streaming and on-demand service providers will no longer be able to offer pan-European services to European viewers unless they move part of their business to an EU member state.
What Britain's S.I.A. says about services
Brexit offers Britain an opportunity to do things differently in financial services, Finance Minister Risi Sunak said yesterday, but the trade deal with the European Union confirms that there will be co-operation in the regulatory approach to the sector. "Now that we have left the EU, we can do things a little differently [ in financial services]," the British PM told the media. "But this agreement is reassuring, because there is a stable regulatory framework for cooperation mentioned in the agreement, which I think will give people confirmation, that we will remain in a - together - dialogue with our European partners when it comes to issues such as mutual implementation decisions."
