The UK government’s Brexit bill passed its final stage, allowing Prime Minister Theresa May to begin divorce proceedings with the European Union by the end of the month.
The bill was given Royal Assent by Queen Elizabeth II, House of Lords Speaker Norman Fowler announced in the chamber in London on Thursday morning. Under Britain’s constitution the monarch’s signature is needed for bills to become law.
The last step was taken after the elected House of Commons overturned two Lords amendments to the bill on Monday, with the unelected upper chamber later acquiescing after a debate stretching past 10:00pm.
The 137-word law gives May the parliamentary permission she needed to invoke Article 50 of the EU’s Lisbon Treaty, the formal trigger for two years of Brexit negotiations. The premier has pledged to do so by the end of the month, with the government signalling it’ll wait until after the 25 March EU Summit in Rome to mark the 60th anniversary of the bloc’s founding charter.
May succeeded in her demand that the Brexit bill pass unchanged through Parliament in spite of displeasure among some of her lawmakers over the government’s refusal to guarantee Parliament a vote in the event negotiations with the EU end without an agreement.
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