The European Union’s top court said a free trade agreement with Singapore needs the approval of national parliaments before it can become legal, in a case widely seen as setting a precedent for the U.K. as it gears up to leave the bloc. The free trade agreement with Singapore cannot, in its current form, be approved by the EU alone, the EU Court of Justice said in a decision Tuesday. The Luxembourg-based court’s rulings are binding and can’t be appealed. Singapore and the EU have been negotiating their free trade agreement since 2010. An adviser to the EU court already signaled in December that individual nations should also ratify it because some aspects, such as dispute settlement, labor and environmental standards and trade in air transport services, fall under national jurisdiction. Judges in Tuesday’s ruling didn’t go as far, which could make national ratification of the post Brexit trade pact “less likely” since the U.K. and EU “aren’t seeking an investment deal,” said Steve Peers, a professor of EU law at the University of Essex. Still, on the Singapore pact, EU nations must have a say because the EU lacks exclusive rights to sign off on a deal covering non-direct foreign investment and a system on dispute settlement between investors and governments. Singapore’s government declined to immediately comment. Representatives of U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May’s ruling Conservative Party didn’t immediately respond to a call and an email. You have to look no further than the EU-Canada accord, which was nearly scuttled last year by a Belgian region, to see that “approval within each of the EU’s member states can be a significant stumbling block in finalizing mixed agreements,” said Alice Darling, a lawyer in Clifford Chance’s trade team. While the formal two-year countdown until Britain leaves the EU was triggered on March 29, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said that the real political negotiations on Article 50 will start after the U.K. has held parliamentary elections on June 8. EU governments are debating a set of directives for the bloc’s negotiator Michel Barnier, outlining the method and objectives of withdrawal talks. “President Juncker anticipated this outcome, when he decided last year that the EU-Canada trade deal should also be ratified at Member State level,” said European Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas. “The commission will now carefully assess and analyse the opinion of the Court and will continue engaging with the European Parliament and member states on the way forward.” The case is: Avis 2/15.