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Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

We might need a different approach in legislation to ensure that the form-filling burden that an Act or legislation imposes is no longer there. I gave an example earlier about form 42, I think it was. I do not think that the noble Earl was in the Chamber at the time, but I would ask him to read Hansard, which might help for further elucidation. Clearly, we do not want a situation where financial costs are placed on individuals and businesses. We do not want to set those things up in such a way as to be an obstacle to the individual’s efficiency, productivity or profitability, let alone a sanction. Removing ““administrative inconvenience”” from Clause 1(3) would thus remove the ability for orders to remove or reduce administrative inconvenience that does not impose an actual financial cost. The Government believe that unnecessary burdens should be removed wherever they fall, whether on the public, private or third—the voluntary—sectors or on individuals. Amendment No. 10 would remove the qualifier ““administrative”” from the types of inconveniences that could be removed by order. I believe that ““administrative inconvenience”” properly captures the kind of inconveniences that orders should be able to remove—for instance, having to complete, as the noble Earl was alarmed about, a form. It is right that this power is limited to administrative inconvenience and does not capture legislation that a Minister might consider is, say, politically inconvenient. If the law is found inconvenient, other than because of the administrative bother that it creates, changes should not be made by order. The order-making process will not be a fast-track way to change the principles behind legislation, but it will be a way to deliver better regulation more quickly and effectively. The term ““administrative inconvenience”” is part of the definition of burdens that allows orders under Clause 1 to deliver better regulation and prevents orders from delivering proposals that do not bring better regulation benefits. For those reasons, we oppose these amendments. For further clarification on forms for the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, the forms might relate to licences, or to compliance with requirements to provide particular regulators with information or to make arrangements for inspectors to visit premises. That is what this Bill is about. It is not about the big constitutional issues that people have seen it as opening up and attacking. It properly deals with improving and lightening the burden of administration and making sure that we genuinely attack administrative issues and inconveniences. I am told that an administrative burdens project has identified these costs and will be establishing targets to reduce them. That is something that we should concentrate on because it will be of benefit to businesses, particularly those in the smaller business sector who feel weighed down by red tape, form-filling and pettifogging bureaucracy.