On 2 September the EFTA Surveillance Authority was reported to be on the point of filing an infringement action against the Icelandic state before the EFTA Court. The file has been ready for some time. It was held in abeyance for months, for one reason: there was a referendum coming, and it was about something else. Alþingi convenes on 10 September, and the bill that would make the case unnecessary is expected to be on the government's list.
The thing being demanded is small enough to print. Protocol 35 to the EEA Agreement reads, in its entirety: “For cases of possible conflicts between implemented EEA rules and other statutory provisions, the EFTA States undertake to introduce, if necessary, a statutory provision to the effect that EEA rules prevail in these cases.” Iceland legislated for the agreement in 1993 and has been trading under it since 1 January 1994. It adopted a general rule at the time. In 2011 the Supreme Court confirmed that the rule was not enough.
This is not a new rule arriving from Brussels. It is an old promise Iceland has spent fifteen years not writing down.
The authority has hardly rushed. It first asked for an explanation in April 2012 and received no reply. It sent a formal notice in December 2017. It delivered a reasoned opinion on 30 September 2020 requiring compliance within three months, and then did nothing for six years. The bill has been laid before Alþingi three times since 2023 and has never been carried. The delay is domestic; the deadline was not.
As for the sovereignty on the placards: the protocol itself says it involves no transfer of legislative power, and the minister who first tabled the bill — Þórdís Kolbrún Reykfjörð Gylfadóttir, of the party now loudest against it — said so in terms. “Protocol 35 explicitly states that it does not include any transfer of legislative powers to any institution of the European Economic Area.” What the clause decides is which of two statutes Alþingi itself passed applies when they collide, and only where Alþingi has not said otherwise. The referendum asked whether to reopen accession talks. It was answered, and the government has accepted the answer: “The message conveyed by the question was not to restart negotiations. We respect that.” The EEA was not on the paper, and honouring it is not defiance of a vote that never mentioned it.
