154 R. Ziegler (European Economic Area) Regulations 20063 which implement the Citizens Directive.4 Nevertheless, while the UK government (July 2016 statement)5 ‘fully expects’ that the legal status of EU-27 citizens ‘will be properly protected’, it refuses to give assurances before the commencement of the withdrawal negotiations. At the time of writing, parliamentary initiatives (Early Day motion 2596, EU Citizens Resident in the UK (Right to Stay) Bill7, and a Rights of EU Nationals motion8) as well as public campaigning (see here9) have not yet come to fruition (but one remains hopeful). Similarly, there is nothing preventing the UK from continuing to enfranchise EU-27 citizens in local government elections (pursuant to section 2 of the Representation of the People Act 198310) even when it is no longer bound to do so in order to implement its treaty obligations. Notably, the UK has broadly interpreted the phrase ‘municipal elections’ in Article 20(2)(b) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union11 so that EU-27 citizens can currently vote in elections for devolved administrations (Scottish Parliament, Welsh Assembly, Northern Ireland Assembly), for the London Assembly, and for mayors (where they are directly elected). Most notably, EU-27 citizens, resident in Scotland, were enfranchised in the 2014 Scottish independence referendum (see EUDO forum discussion12). 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2006/1003/contents/made. http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2004:229:0035: 0048:en:PDF. https://www.gov.uk/government/news/ statement-the-status-of-eu-nationals-in-the-uk http://www.parliament.uk/edm/2016-17/259. http://services.parliament.uk/bills/2016-17/eucitizensresidentintheunitedkingdomrighttostay.html. https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2016-10-19/debates/F1337420-EBD9413C-949B-A4AEA0832B2C/RightsOfEUNationals. ‘Government can “unilaterally” grant EU citizens right to remain after Brexit’, The Guardian, 18 October 2016, available at https://www.theguardian.com/ politics/2016/oct/18/ government-unilateral-eu-citizens-right-to-remain-brexit-roger-casale-nicolashatton. http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1983/2/section/2. https://europadatenbank.iaaeu.de/user/view_legalact.php?id=24 Ziegler, R., J. Shaw & R. Bauböck (eds.) (2014), ‘Independence Referendums: Who Should Vote and Who Should be Offered Citizenship’, Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, EUDO Citizenship Observatory Working Paper 2014/90, available at ?http://cadmus.eui.eu/bitstream/handle/1814/32516/ RSCAS_2014_90.pdf.