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Case Update

Update on the Article 50 case in Edinburgh

9th February 2018

We have decided to proceed with the appeal.

Of the seven original Petitioners, five have agreed that we should appeal. Joanna Cherry QC and Christine Jardine are withdrawing. And I am being added as a Petitioner/Appellant.

Because we are asking you to fund a case which a Judge has declared lacks any reasonable prospect of succeeding we are taking the step of publishing a note prepared by Aidan O’Neill QC and Peter Sellar to advise the Petitioners.

That Note sets out from a technical, legal perspective why the Decision of the Judge below was flawed. You can – indeed, before you fund this case you should – read that Note.

Establishing that, alongside the political route to revocability there is a legal route, is vital in the national interest. If Parliament chooses not to withdraw the Article 50 notice then no harm is done by asking now the question whether it has that right. But if Parliament does come to want to withdraw the notice, knowing it has the right to do so serves the national interest

It improves the bargaining position of the UK, it ensures we retain the opt-outs and rebates that we presently enjoy, and it places the decision entirely in the hands of the UK’s Parliament and – if it chooses – its people.

Jo Maugham QC, Director

Case

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