We've been part of the European Economic Area since 1994, and through that agreement, we've been continuously adopting EU legislation for over three decades. The EEA-Lex database currently lists nearly 9,000 EU legal acts that have been incorporated into the EEA Agreement and are in force here. Nine thousand laws we helped shape in committees but never got to vote on.
To put that in perspective: of the EU legislation that directly affects domestic law — the regulations and directives that businesses, workers, consumers, and institutions must actually comply with — roughly 70% is already part of our legal framework. This covers the entire single market (free movement of goods, services, capital, and people), competition and state aid rules, financial services regulation, transport and energy policy, environmental protection, consumer rights, and social policy.
The remaining 30% clusters in a few specific areas. Agriculture and rural development is the largest single block, accounting for about half of what's left — the EU's Common Agricultural Policy is extensive and we've never been part of it. Fisheries is next. Then customs union rules, taxation (particularly VAT harmonisation), economic and monetary policy (the euro), and justice and home affairs.
This means that if we were to restart accession negotiations, we wouldn't be starting from scratch. Far from it. The screening process — where the EU Commission examines a candidate country's alignment with EU law, chapter by chapter — would find us already compliant in the majority of areas. This is why, during the 2010–2013 negotiations, EU officials suggested that our accession could proceed faster than any previous candidate's.
The question isn't really about volume — it's about the political difficulty of the remaining areas. Fisheries and agriculture are each relatively small by regulatory volume but enormous by political weight. The accession process would be dominated by negotiations in those two areas, plus the question of the euro. Everything else is largely already done.
Sources: EEA-Lex database, EFTA Surveillance Authority; EUR-Lex, legislative summaries in force; Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Report on the Status of the EEA Agreement 2024.