The Great EU Repeal Bill White Paper and family law

David Hodson responds to the government White Paper in respect of legislating for the UK withdrawal from the EU. His conclusion in the response is that unlike many other areas of law and with a couple of exceptions EU family law works only on an entirely reciprocal basis. Since the first EU family law in March 2001 it has not created stand-alone laws which can be easily and simply put into national law. Therefore putting EU law simply into national law will not work without reciprocity nor is it needed. On the couple of exceptions in one maintenance jurisdiction there is satisfactory existing domestic provisions and in another divorce jurisdiction there are real problems in simply adopting the EU law itself as national law and instead practitioners have recently proposed new reforms which will be simpler and more beneficial than adopting wholesale EU laws. David also highlights the various problems of adopting EU family laws into national law on their own by going through the wide range of areas of family law.

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