Assimilated law – the role and future of retained EU law in the UK

At the University of Oxford, a conference on “Assimilated law – the role and future of retained EU law in the UK” will be held on 13 and 14 April 2026. It is jointly organised by Professor Anne Davies and Dr Johannes Ungerer; it is funded by the Institute of European and Comparative Law as part of its 30th anniversary events.

The concept, category or chimaera of assimilated law emerged in the UK after Brexit: when becoming a Non-Member State, the UK chose to retain many EU laws in its domestic legal system,¹ and this body of law has since been labelled ‘assimilated law’.² There is an urgent need to explore and understand how assimilated law operates and might develop in future in the UK. Pressing questions concern how assimilated law is to be applied and interpreted and how it and the underlying EU laws might develop and diverge over time. Courts in the UK and on the Continent already had to deal with complex matters arising with regard to assimilated law, so there is a real need to distil and disseminate academic insights. In Lipton,³ the UK Supreme Court dealt with some initial questions, but they only addressed a small portion of the underlying issues.

The conference will bring together legal scholars and practitioners to establish a common understanding of the practices and challenges regarding assimilated law. The conference will be structured in two parts over the course of one and a half days: first, general questions about assimilated law will be debated, so that common themes, trends, and topics can be explored. Secondly, particularly tricky issues will be addressed which pertain to assimilated law in specific areas.

Information about the conference programme and possibilities to attend will be announced in due course.

¹ European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, amended by the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Act 2020.
² Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Act 2023.
³ Lipton v BA Cityflyer [2024] UKSC 24.