UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson | Leon Neal/Getty Images UK seeks new powers for judges to reject EU court rulings Downing Street dismissed suggestions the move could allow the government to water down EU safeguards.

LONDON — Boris Johnson will seek to increase the power of U.K. courts to overrule the Court of Justice of the European Union, Downing Street confirmed.

The prime minister will insert a clause into his Withdrawal Agreement Bill which will allow lower courts to reject CJEU rulings in order to help Britain to “take back control of our laws,” a Number 10 spokesman said.

The plan would make ineffective Theresa May’s decision — arrived at after much painful political and legal wrangling in 2018 — to put only the U.K.’s top courts on the same legal footing as the CJEU.

As part of the 2018 EU Withdrawal Bill, May’s government granted the power to “depart” from EU case law only with the Supreme Court in England and the High Court of Justiciary in Scotland.

But confirming the change of plan, the Downing Street spokesman said: “The bill will ensure that the Supreme Court is not the only institution able to consider retaining European Court of Justice rulings. This is an important change, which will ensure that we do not face a legal bottleneck and inadvertently stay bound by EU rulings for many years."

The legal change threatens to create considerable “judicial disquiet,” according to Catherine Barnard, a professor of EU law at the University of Cambridge.

He added: "We will take back control of our laws and disentangle ourselves from the EU legal order, just as it was promised to the British people.”

The spokesman dismissed suggestions the move could allow the government to water down EU safeguards on workers' rights and other protections. “These will be matters for British courts, as was promised to the British people,” he said. The government is expected to reveal plans on Thursday for a separate bill covering workers' rights.

But the legal change threatens to create considerable “judicial disquiet,” according to Catherine Barnard, a professor of EU law at the University of Cambridge.

“If what Boris Johnson is saying is that any court can overturn decisions of the CJEU, this is really quite problematic,” she explained. “It’s not at all clear what legal status in the hierarchy of precedent CJEU judgments should have.” She added: “We have a very clear hierarchy of norms … Suddenly to have a whole body of CJEU decisions whose legal status is very unclear would create considerable legal uncertainty.”

The Withdrawal Agreement Bill is expected to face its first votes since the general election in the House of Commons on Friday.