The Bill will establish the Local Better Regulation Office with the aim of bringing consistency to local authority enforcement. Specifically, the Bill will establish the Local Better Regulation Office, implement four of the recommendations of the Macrory Review, and, place a requirement on regulators not to impose or maintain unnecessary burdens.

The Bill takes forward a Cabinet Office consultation on the draft Regulatory, Enforcement and Sanctions Bill as well as work on Philip Hampton’s report on reducing administrative burden’s and Richard Macrory’s report on making sanctions effective.

The trade minister Lord Jones of Birmingham introduced second reading debate in the Lords and explained that the Bill builds on and takes forward the better regulation agenda, "taking further important steps towards modern and effective regulatory enforcement, by making four significant changes."

Detailing the provisions of the Bill, Jones explained that:-

Part 1 creates in statutory form an expert body - the Local Better Regulation Office - with a remit to improve the way in which the government, regulators and local authorities work together in enforcing regulations.

Part 2 creates a statutory framework giving greater certainty and consistency of treatment for businesses which operate across local authority boundaries by granting them a right to one single primary authority.

Part 3 gives regulators access to a suite of more flexible and proportionate sanctions, which will provide alternative routes to promoting better compliance with relevant regulations.

Part 4 brings greater effectiveness and accountability to the way in which regulators work in practice by putting a greater focus on the removal of unnecessary regulatory burden.

Jones concluded his comments by referring to his time as head of the Confederation of British Industry: "My time as director-general of the CBI enabled me to see at first hand time and again how something that is, on the face of it, a well-intentioned piece of regulation goes on to cause unnecessary expense, bog down wealth creation, kill enterprise—specifically small businesses—and drive commercial activity into a mire of bureaucratic compliance. The regulation itself loses credibility among the very people who should respect it and it ends up not only being a red tape sledgehammer cracking the occasional nut but reducing global competitiveness, debilitating the businesses of the country, and making the lives of regulators and the officers of local authorities impossible. The Bill is designed to put an end to all of that".

For the Conservatives, Baroness Wilcox questioned if the Bill would "achieve those covetable aims" as set out by the minister.

On the question of the role of the Local Better Regulation Office, Wilcox was concerned that there as "an apparent mismatch between the purpose of the Local Better Regulation Office described in the consultation document and that defined in the draft Bill".

All the Bill does, Wilcox added, was to "introduce more regulation in an optimistic bid to mend a broken system".

Wilcox concluded by rebutting Jones' assertion that the Bill would secure 'light touch' regulation. "I do not see that this Bill manages this in any shape or form; rather, it introduces yet more regulations and more enforcement bodies, making tasks more and more onerous. Business and the consumer are being bound so tight they have no real place to move. Having read this Bill from cover to cover, all that I can ask the Minister is: is this really the future of regulation that he dreamed of when he was running the Confederation of British Industry? I dare say that it is not."

The Liberal Democrat spokesman, Lord Razzall, concurred with Wilcox' fears when he stated: "the Bill will represent a missed opportunity in its effect on the dead hand of regulation".

Razzall raised three specific concerns about the Bill: the aim of the Bill to instil the principles of better regulation into every part of the UK regulatory environment; the process of the imposition of penalties; and, stop notices and their effect on loss of revenue for businesses.

House of Lords

First reading: November 8 2007 [HL Bill 7]

Second reading: November 28 2007