Businesses think govt regulation 'has got worse'

Thursday, 22 October 2009 12:01 AM

By Emmeline Saunders

Less than a third of all companies believe the government understands business enough to regulate it, a National Audit Office (NAO) survey has found.

Just one per cent of businesses felt complying with regulations had become less time consuming in the last year.

The survey questioned 2,037 senior managers about complying with regulation. It found 95 per cent of businesses struggled to keep up to date with changes to existing regulations. This had either not improved or had become more time consuming in the last year.

NAO head Amyas Morse said: "There is always a difference between perception and reality but our testing shows that almost no businesses think that complying with regulation has become easier or less time consuming in the last year.

"The majority think that things have remained the same and over a third think that the burden of regulation has got worse."

But the survey also found 42 per cent of businesses thought the government is getting the right balance of regulation to protect people and the environment, possibly as a result of the Administrative Burdens Reduction Programme (ABRP).

The programme was launched by the government after chancellor Alistair Darling's decision to relax the amount of red tape businesses encountered in regulation.

It aims to reduce by a quarter the cost to businesses of paperwork and red tape to deal with bureaucratic regulations by 2010.

It forms part of the government's agenda to simplify regulation, which was reported to have made a net £1.9 billion per year of savings last December.

However, the NAO warned this claim must be viewed with caution, as the reported figure is only an estimate of actual savings.

The results of the survey showed perceptions of regulations are influenced by concerns about the introduction of new regulations, or changes to existing regulations.

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• business and industry
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• economy
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• industry
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• regulation