Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, following the White Paper, The future relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union, published 12 September, what steps they have taken to accede to the Lugano Convention.

We have made clear our intention to continue the UK’s participation in the Lugano Convention after our exit from the EU, in order to maintain our existing civil judicial cooperation with Norway, Iceland and Switzerland. We expect our continued participation in this Convention to form part of the wider agreement on civil judicial cooperation we will reach with the EU.

Throughout our Exit discussions, the EU has been clear that the UK’s continued participation in the Lugano Convention is a ‘future state’ issue, which can only be negotiated once we have concluded the Withdrawal Agreement. We remain confident of reaching agreement on the Withdrawal Agreement which will secure our continued participation in the Convention to the end of the Implementation Period. This will provide time until the end of 2020 to enable the UK, the EU and all the other parties to the convention to come to an agreement on a legally secure permanent transition for the UK.

We have met with Switzerland, Iceland and Norway to make clear our desire to continue to participate in the Lugano Convention once we have left the EU.