CEN and CENELEC agreement on UK membership safeguards compatibility of standards

New full membership category

In June 2021, the CEN and CENELEC General Assemblies overwhelmingly agreed to revise the membership arrangements in their Statutes and Internal Regulations. The agreement comes after careful consideration by the CEN and CENELEC members of the impacts of the UK’s exit from the EU on the European standardization system and on the organisations’ membership statutes.

The General Assemblies agreed to create three categories of full membership in each of the two associations: one for states that are members of the European Economic Area; one for states that are members of EFTA, but not EEA, or are accession countries; and one for states, such as the UK, that have an agreement with the EU and can demonstrate either convergent or compatible market regulation in relevant areas.

Market access

BSI will undergo an assessment against the new category of membership in the third quarter of 2021. The status of BSI, the British Standards Institution, in CEN and CENELEC is expected to be confirmed in November, following the assessment against the new category of membership in the third quarter of 2021. This will enable BSI to transfer to a new category of full membership within CEN and CENELEC from 1 January 2022.

The new membership definitions will provide confidence for standardisation stakeholders in the compatibility of standards across Europe. It will safeguard the principles of the European standardization system to provide market access for stakeholders. The new provisions will maintain the way stakeholders engage with CEN and CENELEC, retaining all the rights in standards developing committees as now. BSI, the UK National Standards Body, will continue to adopt and update European standards (ENs) into the UK national catalogue. UK adoptions of ENs are identical in technical content to all other European standards used by CEN and CENELEC members.