The regulatory cuts are to be made by developing a more targeted and risk based inspection service for business.
A key budget theme was the promise to reduce the impacts of regulation on businesses and the endorsement of recommendations made in two key reports by both the Chancellor Gordon Brown and the Prime Minister.
The Hampton Review, released to coincide with the budget, contains proposals designed to develop a system of risk assessment for inspections and it estimates that a more targeted system will reduce the overall number of inspections by one million – a cut of one third.
It also says that regulators should send out less forms and concentrate on giving better support and advice to business.
Less is more
The second report from the Better Regulation Task Force titled “Less is More” puts forward a methodology for measuring and reducing the administrative burdens on business and for controlling the overall levels of regulation.
The Department for Environment, Food and Agriculture has already promised a 25% reduction in red tape and Mrs Beckett said she is committed to streamlining and improving regulation in line with the recommendations of both these reports.
Gordon Brown said in his Budget speech: “Instead of a one size fits all approach which can mean that unnecessary inspections are carried out while necessary ones are not, the best practice risk-based regulation now means more inspection only where there is more risk and a light and limited touch where there is less risk.”
He said the that there will in future be just five inspection bodies for environmental protection, food safety, the countryside, agriculture and animal health – compared with 22 separate bodies in 1997 when Labour took power.
Along with this Mrs Beckett welcomed a “clear commitment to protecting the environment” within the budget.
She said: “I welcome in particular the new measures promoting environmental protection: environmental protection is important not only in its own right but as a staple of economic growth.”
The budget reconfirmed the expected 3 increase per tonne in Landfill Tax from April 1 2005, but freezed the Aggregates Levy for the second year in a row at 1.60 per tonne.
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