While there has been wide spread reactions to the majority of people in the UK voting to leave the EU, the question that many are asking is whether the Thursday’s referendum on Brexit legally binding.

“No” is the simple answer to the question as to whether the EU referendum is legally binding or not. UK Prime Minister David Cameron always had the option to decide to ignore the will of the people and put the question to MPs banking on a majority deciding to remain. This is in theory off course as Cameron is a well established skeptic of Brexit.

This is so because in the UK referendums are generally not legally binding and the parliament is sovereign. There has been however one exception when the relevant legislation obligated the government to change the law to reflect a “yes” vote had that occurred in 2011 in a referendum on changing the electoral system to alternative vote. However the EU referendum n- popularly called Brexit, did not have any such provisions contained in it.

The rightwing Conservative MP Enoch Powell, unhappy about what he considered a loss of national sovereignty, argued that the result of the vote on whether to stay in the EU conducted in 1975, was merely provisional as it could not be legally binding on parliament. At that tine EU was known as the European Economic Community.

As had already been announced, post a positive Brexit referendum result, the British Prime Minister David Cameron had the legal option to decide on whether to invoke article 50 or not. He did not do that eventually as the referendum was not legally binding on him or the parliament to do so. Article 50 is essentially a formal notification by the UK government to the EU about its decision to leave the 28 country block.

While invoking the article 50 would indicate the UK government’s pledge that the Brexit – though not legally binding on them, is an irreversible process, some advocates of Brexit argue that discussions with other member states could start informally. This can be done without article 50 having to be invoked.

Since the referendum is not legally binding, there are also possibilities being talked about by some in the ‘Leave EU” camp that Thursday’s referendum could be used as a mere threat of departure following the vote to leave against the EU. This opportunity presented by the referendum could then be used to smooth the way to a better deal for Britain from the EU. This in turn can be again put before the British pubic to vote in a second referendum on EU membership.

David Cameron has not invoked article 50 as on Friday and coupled with the non legal nature of the referendum to leave EU has left open scopes for using the referendum as a threat against the EU. All is possible due to the non legally binding nature of the referendum on the UK government.

(Source:www.theguardian.com)

Categories: Geopolitics, Regulations & Legal, Uncategorized