Press Release

FSB welcomes BERR simplification efforts

11 December 2007

John Wright, National Chairman of the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) today met with John Hutton, Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) and welcomed the Government’s efforts to simplify regulations and reduce administrative burdens for the UK’s 4.5 million small businesses.

BERR today published a report outlining measures the Government has taken to reduce red tape, including taking the payment of tax credits from employers and giving it to HM Revenue & Customs, making small business rate relief automatic and exempting small businesses from unnecessary company law rules.

The FSB has consistently called for a culture change in the way government handles legislation and regulation. The UK’s biggest business organisation emphasised that more could be done to free up small businesses to do what they do best, namely supporting the UK economy by creating jobs and generating wealth.

John Wright, FSB National Chairman, said:

“Small businesses produce over 50 percent of UK GDP and employ over half of the private sector workforce. But they are consistently held back by unnecessary regulation and form-filling.

“There seems to be a real effort now to get to terms with the vexed issue of over-regulation and we applaud all those who have been involved with it and will hopefully drive this programme forward in the future.”

“But nobody should be complacent. There is still more to do. The one size fits all approach to business regulation must be done away with for good. Small businesses don’t have the support and expertise to deal with regulation in the same way that big companies do.”