Environment and Sustainability Policies after Brexit: Where Are Resources Going to Come from?

The European Union has been traditionally considered an advocate of sustainability and resources have been received by all member States in order to improve environmental conditions and promote a sustainable future. Once Brexit becomes a reality, the UK will stop receiving funding from the EU so one of the areas more likely to be affected will be the environmental one. On the other hand, the UK is a net contributor to the EU budget, so a decrease in contributions may affect the funding available in general for other member States, and again this would potentially affect environmental and sustainability projects. The purpose of this paper is to explore how both the UK and the EU look at this scenario in terms of adaptation of the resources available for the sustainability agenda. It will analyse the possibilities of reallocation of resources, particularly coming from environmental tax revenues, in order to keep up projects development in a scenario of reduction of funding. At the same time it will try to find out, given that we are in a very preliminary stage of Brexit, the possible changes of attitude of policymakers with regard to environmental matters in trying to assess if, as it happened in many countries during the last international economic crisis, environment and sustainability were put aside and relegated as policy priorities.