French lawyer hopeful after first Brexit hearing

After a two-hour hearing at the EU’s General Court, French lawyer Julien Fouchet told the media he’s optimistic about the next stage of the anti-Brexit case.

Although Bordeaux advocate Fouchet lodged his case against Brexit’s legality a year ago, the hearing still focused on the preliminaries in the hope of persuading the five-strong group of judges it’s worthwhile enough to be presented to a full hearing. It’s founded on actual harm done to Fouchet’s expat clients by the result of a referendum in which they were forbidden to participate, thus penalising them for making use of their EU citizen-conferred rights to free movement. Therefore, as a result, the Brexit negotiations should be declared illegal.

Fouchet made it clear to the panel of judges that his clients would face real harm should they lose their EU citizenship as it includes the cancellation of their right to remain in their chosen countries. One of his clients, 97-year old Harry Shindler, has lived in Italy since the end of WWII and could be forced to repatriate to the UK. Fouchet told the court the case is literally the last possible defence for British citizens living and working in Europe as other pending cases, including the Amsterdam case, were unlikely to be resolved before next March.

According to the panel of judges, three issues will be discussed before the case is allowed to proceed – firstly that it's admissible on its merits, secondly that it is not and thirdly that another hearing should be called to consider both the detailed arguments and the case’s admissibility. According to Fouchet, the judges were very interested in the legal points and asked many questions. One debate, he said, revolved around the ‘Article 50 Challenge’ legal case which attempts to prove the article was not legally presented as a clear decision by the British parliament wasn’t given. This case is at present awaiting a decision on an appeal as it was rejected at its first hearing.