EU to finalize EU-UK regulatory forum following post-Brexit Northern Ireland deal

The European Union’s executive branch said it would start to finalize the long-delayed discussion forum for the EU and the United Kingdom’s financial regulators. The move follows the deal that potentially solved the dispute between the UK and the bloc over Northern Ireland trade.

The European Commission said on Wednesday that it would work on finalizing the forum for the bloc’s and the UK’s financial regulators once the UK implements the deal. The forum was originally due to be created on March 2021 but was put on hold over the dispute with the post-Brexit trade in Northern Ireland. The issues have since been resolved in the form of a new deal that was made last month between both sides, formerly referred to as the Northern Ireland Protocol and now called the Windsor Framework.

“We are ready to start work on the finalization of the Memorandum of Understanding on financial services regulatory cooperation,” said the spokesperson for the EU Commission’s financial services unit. “Once the Windsor Framework is implemented, this MoU would allow for a relationship similar to that with other third countries with an important financial services sector.”

The forum, similar to what the EU has with the United States, has no mandate to decide on EU financial market access. However, financial industry experts say that the forum could improve cross-Channel relations in the field and help ease tensions in areas including derivatives clearing.

Last week, London Stock Exchange Chief Executive David Schwimmer said that improving EU-UK relations was “a good thing” to help prevent fragmentation in markets.

On Monday, Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party set up a group to undergo a month-long consultation on the Windsor Framework that the pro-British party’s lawmakers have yet to decide whether to support. Whether the deal would be successful would depend on the DUP, the largest party in the region that has declared to boycott the power-sharing government over the original post-Brexit trade rules.

“The group will work independently and will provide me with a report by the end of March,” said DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson in a statement. “They will want to engage with a broad section of the unionist and loyalist community, the business sector, civic society, and others who want to see Northern Ireland prosper within the Union.”