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Uncertainty in ESIF Programming and Regional Policy in the UK journal article

An Article 50 Half-Time Analysis

Jayne Woolford

European Structural and Investment Funds Journal, Volume 6 (2018), Issue 2, Page 179 - 185

The UK referendum on EU membership resulted in a vote to leave. One year on from the triggering of Article 50 on March 29 2017, and with one year of membership of the bloc remaining, there are still many unknowns. The UK European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF) programmes are particularly vulnerable to the uncertainties surrounding the negotiations and the future UK-EU relationship, with UK withdrawal cutting across the 2014-2020 Multi-annual Financial Framework (MFF). The UK is due to exit the EU on 29 March 2019, with a transitional period until 31 December 2020 leaving the UK with Third Country status for the last 21 months of the current MFF period. Political agreement to date allows for UK continued participation in ESIF programming until the end of the current programming period and potentially in the subsequent post-2020 MFF. Whilst there is some comfort that the status quo may be maintained during the current programming period, this article seeks to outline the challenges around the implementation of regional policy in the UK as its status changes from EU Member State (MS) to Third Country under a transitional period, and beyond.


Implications of Brexit for UK ESI Fund Programming and Future Regional Policy journal article open-access

Jayne Woolford

European Structural and Investment Funds Journal, Volume 4 (2016), Issue 3, Page 144 - 148

The UK referendum on EU membership resulted in a vote to leave the bloc. The UK and EU are currently in limbo whilst the withdrawing Member State prepares to trigger Article 50 and formally notify its intent to depart. The financial, legal and economic implications are expected to be wide-ranging although the process of unpicking the interlinkages across different policy areas has not yet begun. In the case of Cohesion Policy, the negotiation of an end date for eligibility and the extent to which the established regulatory procedures around N+3 and programme closure will be applied to the departing UK will be crucial, not only in determining the exact financial ‘hit’ to UK regions of Brexit but also in terms of implications for programming on the ground. Regulatory specificities mean that the withdrawal process could be characterised by regions who voted to leave the EU still spending their EU allocations and required to comply with EU law long after UK withdrawal.

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