Ratification
If the negotiations solely focus on trade, the European Commission can argue that it has exclusive competence. This would mean that ratification is relatively simple and quick: only the European Council (the national leaders), and the European Parliament need to sign off on the deal. Indeed, at the Council, a non-mixed agreement could be decided by a qualified majority vote – it would not require unanimity. (See the section on sovereignty and law for further details on competences and voting.)
However, if the partnership covers shared competences like the environment, it is a ‘mixed agreement’. Ratification of a mixed agreement takes longer to achieve. In this case, each member state needs to ratify the agreement in line with its sovereign political arrangements. As each member state (and some regional parliaments) need to approve the deal, it also becomes more complicated and harder to negotiate, not least because each legislature has a veto.
The EU UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement is an Association Agreement, which uses Article 217 of the EU Treaty. This requires unanimity in the European Council and the consent of the European Parliament, but not necessarily approval by national and regional parliaments. After the European Parliament and Council have voted on the UK-EU agreement, it can be applied provisionally and ratified during early 2021. See section on EU-UK Agreement for more details.
Implementation
The future UK-EU partnership requires new operational processes, systems and procedures to be implemented. It will also take time for government and business to adjust. Commonly, an FTA is phased in over several years to give time for businesses to adjust to the new trade conditions. For example, the EU’s CETA with Japan phases in tariff reductions over seven years.
Therefore, it would have been sensible for the UK and the EU to have agreed to phase in the implementation of new trade barriers over several years. This would also allow time to negotiate the supplemental agreements.
Government and business both need time to design and implement the systems and other infrastructure necessary to operate the new partnership. From a trade perspective alone, Pascal Lamy, previously Director-General of the WTO, has said this could take four to five further years.