UK Now Set to Leave Jan. 31 With Transition Deal After Decisive Election Result

The United Kingdom is now set to leave the European Union on Jan. 31 under the terms of a recently re-negotiated transition deal, after Prime Minister Boris Johnson won a resounding victory in elections held Dec. 12. Now holding a 365-seat majority to Labour’s 203 seats and the Scottish National Party’s 48, Johnson plans to hold a vote Dec. 20 on his Brexit deal, which is likely to pass, according to reports from the BBC and The Guardian.

The decisive result ends a long period of uncertainty caused by Conservatives’ previously slim margin in Parliament. A victory by Labour and their allies would have led to a second referendum, while a “hung parliament” with no clear majority could have caused a no-deal Brexit if the Jan. 31 deadline passed without either approval of the transition deal or another extension.

Assuming the transition deal is passed, work will then begin between U.K. and EU negotiators to come up with a permanent framework for their future relationship. Johnson has pledged to have that permanent agreement in place by the beginning of 2021, though the transition deal can be extended until the end of 2021 or 2022, and agreeing on a permanent solution within a year may prove difficult if talks on the transition deal were any indication.

For now, the U.K.’s insistence on ending the transition agreement by the end of 2020 carries some risk of leaving before a new trade deal can come into force, and also may limit the scope of what can be agreed,” according to a post on Herbert Smith Freehills’ Brexit Notes blog. But for now, “EU law will continue to apply in the UK until the end of the transition period and immediate changes associated with leaving will be small and, if they occur, more likely to affect UK trade with very few third countries than with the EU.”