The UK Government has announced that the Attorney General and Advocate General for Scotland have referred the Brexit legislation recently passed by the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly to the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court will be asked to rule on whether the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly have the legal powers to make the UK Withdrawal from the European Union (Legal Continuity) (Scotland) Bill and the Law Derived from the European Union (Wales) Bill respectively.
Under the Scotland Act 1998 and the Government of Wales Act 2006, before the devolved Brexit legislation could become law, the law officers had four weeks following the passing of the legislation on 21 March in which to ask the Supreme Court to rule on whether it was legally competent.
For more on the background to this reference see our earlier posts on what the Scottish bill seeks to do and whether it is within devolved powers.
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