by Brianna Crandall — August 22, 2012—As part of a drive to cut red tape burdens for British businesses, the U.K.’s Minister of State for Energy Charles Hendry announced on August 7 the scrapping of 86 regulations and a further 48 improved regulatory regimes, while reportedly keeping protections as strong as ever.
Coupled with other reforms, the Department of Energy and Climate Change’s (DECC) overall reform package is expected to deliver businesses savings worth an estimated £400 million over the next 20 years.
“Energy is vital to the economy and essential to driving growth,” said Hendry. “It is also the biggest infrastructure sector in the U.K. Our reforms aim to stimulate over £100 billion of new investment in the electricity sector and could support around 250,000 total jobs in electricity to 2030.”
Support for the announcement came from such quarters as Terry A’Hearn, Regulation Lead of the Aldersgate Group, who noted that “smart regulation corrects market failures, drives innovation and provides the foundation for long-term economic growth,” and David Porter, Chief Executive of Energy U.K., who commended DECC “for removing redundant legislation and for modifying a number of overly complex regulations,” calling the move “a step in the right direction.”
Together with DECC’s simplifications to the European Emissions Trading Scheme and the Carbon Reduction Commitment regimes, this is expected to help businesses save around £400 million over twenty years.
The Red Tape Challenge was launched in April 2011 to reduce and reform the stock of regulations on the U.K. statute book.
