Brexit: Five Action Points For Businesses To Consider

Introduction

Faced with the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and its widespread, economic fallout, Brexit may not be top of mind for many executives at the current time. Despite Brexit happening on 31 January, it did not (unlike the ensuing pandemic) produce dire consequences for business.

The continuity was due to the one-year transition period under the EU-UK Withdrawal Agreement ("Transition Period"), which basically provided for the UK to continue to be part of the EU Single Market, Customs Union and VAT regime until the end of 2020.

Maintaining stability depends upon the EU and UK agreeing a trade deal before the Transition Period comes to a close. The prospects of that do not look good. Progress was reportedly very slow in July's negotiating round with the two parties' positions a long way apart. Even if a trade deal is negotiated before the end of the year, the compressed timescale means any agreement now reached is highly unlikely to be