With the UK set to leave the European Union in March 2019, Britain’s parliament is facing a great legislative challenge; it must decide how to deal with almost 19,000 EU laws and regulations once we have left the EU.
For many of the leave voters, this means that we can finally ‘cut through the Brussels red tape’ with its rules on everything from e-cigarettes to pesticides. However, for many remain voters there is a fear of a dangerous free-for-all.
The UK government will now face the challenge of finding the right balance between allowing businesses freedom to make their own decisions and enforcing certain regulations.
Richard Angell, director at Progress, argued that having a low regulation economy post Brexit could have ‘disastrous consequences’. He added that Non-Tariff Barriers need to be given careful consideration to ensure UK regulations are similar to other countries, as otherwise we may have difficulty accessing these markets.
Abdool Kara, executive leader at National Audit Office, and Josie Appleton, director at Manifesto Club, took a different stance and suggested that there may now be too many regulations. Josie indicated that some regulations need a ‘common sense check’; I’m sure many people agree that putting “this may be hot” on a kettle is slightly unnecessary.
I was very pleased to see that the panellists were eager to offer their opinions on the food industry; particularly agriculture and food processing.
Christopher Snowdon, head of lifestyle economics at the Institute of Economic Affairs, spoke about chlorinated chicken and the idea that the British public think that the EU is ‘better than the US because it regulates against it’.
In his view, politicians may be reluctant to remove this restriction because it pleases the public, even though abolishing it would not harm public welfare. Richard was quick to point out Britain’s high food production standards and that removing regulations against things like chlorinated chicken could have a negative impact on these standards.
One audience member disagreed with Richard saying that ‘regulations and standards are not the same thing’ because standards are voluntary whereas regulations are legal requirements. High animal welfare standards are something that I think Britain should be very proud of and should really ensure that these standards are maintained post-Brexit.
See also: The NFU's work on behalf of members on Brexit.
The issue of WTO agreements was touched upon with the viewpoint of many that these are global regulations on trade that cannot be avoided if we want to trade globally. However, others argued that businesses should only have to obey EU and global regulations if they are exporting goods.
On the whole it seems that people are very divided about where regulations are needed and where they aren’t. There does, however, appear to be a consensus that the UK government needs to give careful consideration to future laws and regulations to build strong and profitable trading partners for the future.
I found that this debate really highlighted the importance of the next few years in ensuring the long term prosperity of Britain, without the EU.
It was also very interesting to hear the opinions of different industry experts and their approaches to tackling these issues. As a nation I think we are going to have to find the best possible solution to make sure Brexit has a positive impact on Britain.