Competition Law and State Aid in the ‘Brexit White Paper’: sensible alignment or unworkable proposals?

(by Andreas Stephan) In a previous blog post, I wrote of the UK Prime Minister’s unexpected discussion of Competition and State Aid, as two areas of policy where the UK’s Laws might remain “identical” to those of the EU, and where UK courts would “continue to look at” the Court of Justice of the European Union’s (CJEU) judgements. Following a dramatic few weeks in which the UK Government finally set out an agreed approach to its Brexit negotiations with the EU, a 104 page White Paper was published putting some flesh on the principles agreed by ministers. In this blog post, I discuss the extent to which the proposals on Competition and State Aid are workable.