After lengthy negotiations, the EU and the UK have landed an agreement for post-Brexit relationship

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Framing the new relationship between the EU and the UK has not been an easy task, with negotiators landing a complex deal just before Christmas.

On 29th December 2020, the EU-UK trade and cooperation agreement was approved by the Council, by written procedure.

On 30th December the President of the European Council and the President of the European Commission signed the EU-UK trade and cooperation agreement, ensuring that it could be provisionally applied as of 1st January 2021. The agreement still requires the consent of the European Parliament to be formally concluded.

Also on 30th December, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson signed the EU-UK trade and cooperation agreement. The House of Commons and the Lords followed suit and the post-Brexit trade agreement passed into UK law late overnight.

The European Parliament accepted the provisional application of the agreement as a “unique exception” and will "carefully examine the agreement and prepare Parliament's consent decision to be discussed and adopted in plenary in due time and before the end of the provisional application". The ratification could be completed in the March Plenary session (March 8-11), and multiple committees are currently at work reviewing the texts.

Once the European Parliament has given its consent and once all procedures necessary for the entry into force have been completed, the Council will adopt the decision on the conclusion of the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement.

European Commission explanatory documents on the EU-UK trade and cooperation agreement can be found here: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_20_2531  (including the full “Agreement in Principle”)