Kemi Badenok decided that “a new approach is needed.” Photo: Chris J. Ratcliffe/Bloomberg.
Kemi Badenoch said it was impossible to advance the government's plans to repeal all European Union laws due to Whitehall's intransigence.
On Wednesday, the business secretary announced that she could only repeal or reform about 600 EU laws immediately due to the situation she inherited.
The decline comes despite the fact that Prime Minister Rishi Sunak promised to eliminate all rules remaining in the law book by the end of the year.
Jacob Rees-Mogg, cabinet minister responsible for reform under Boris Johnson, accused the ministers of inertia and said the “blot” had triumphed.
In an article for The Telegraph, Ms Badenoch blamed the move on behavior unnamed Whitehall officials, but insisted that her new approach would eventually lead to more regulatory reform.
“When I was put in charge of this bill, I saw that, faced with a default stance on keeping the EU law expiring at the end of this year, Whitehall departments were focusing on which laws should be kept ahead of schedule rather than pursuing significant goal. reforms that the government and business want to see,” she said.
“I decided that a new approach was needed; one that will allow ministers and officials to focus on further reforming the REUL [retained EU law] and do it faster.”
During his campaign, Mr Sunak promised to repeal or revise 2,400 EU laws in the first 100 days his tenure as prime minister.
The government's commitment to repeal all such laws by the end of 2023 under current law has been deferred. as civil servants continued to find new EU laws. They are now believed to have found 4,800 people.
'Whitehall's failure'
Mr Rees-Mogg, former Brexit secretary, said: ministers' inability to push it through their own departments.”
“This is the victory of the “drop” over the specific promise of the Prime Minister. Deregulation, which could have lowered prices and lowered inflation, has been abandoned because of idle civil servants and inert ministers.” voice their concerns.
The government is expected to publish a list of 600 bills soon to be scrapped as part of the retained EU bill. have been canceled or changed.
But that means far less than half of the promised 4,800 laws will be repealed by the end of 2023.
Ms Badenoch insisted that more laws could be repealed even after the end of the year.
“Getting rid of EU laws in the UK needs to be more than a race against a deadline,” she said. “It should be about making our laws work for the people who use them.”
“Regulatory reform is integral to the Prime Minister's mission to boost the UK economy; a mission that puts business, consumers and the British public first.”
She added: “I will make it a priority to re-energize the project to define and eliminate more unnecessary rules.”
< p>p>
“It is critical that by the end of 2023 we will end the EU rule of law and give our courts the ability to derogate from the case law of the European Court of Justice. Through this, we will regain full control of our laws, as promised in the manifesto of the Conservative Party.” called “a humiliating U-turn.”
One senior member of the European Study Group said: “We are very disappointed that the REUL bill, which passed through the House of Commons with the overwhelming backing of the Parliamentary Party, is now being watered down by our own government in the House of Lords “. /p>
“There is still time to prevent this decision, and we really hope that the government will reconsider its decision.”
Another pro-Brexit MP said: “This is dangerous for Rishi Sunak. He sold himself as someone to trust, and he broke that promise. His circle of loyal supporters is smaller than before.
“The incentive for Conservative MPs to stay up late and vote diminishes when the government is not in control. It will undermine the majority.”
Lord Jackson, a Conservative colleague, tweeted:
Rejected this bill, but is about to publish a bill on methods of treatment at the direction of Stonewall, which will cause controversy and criminalize thousands. Yes. conservative government. https://t.co/3VeS6nXmgr
— Stuart Jackson (@BrexitStewart) May 10, 2023
Jenny Chapman, Labor cabinet spokeswoman, said: “This is a humiliating reversal by a weak and divided government that doesn't know how to develop our economy, protect workers, support businesses or build a better Britain outside the EU.”
In her article, Ms Badenoch also confirmed that the government will consult on changes to the Working Time Directive, such as relaxing the requirement for firms to record how long people work.
“As part of this drive to more deregulation, today I am announcing that we will make improvements to labor laws that could help businesses save around £1bn a year while protecting workers’ rights,” she said.
“We will advise on eliminate unnecessary red tape in time tracking, make it easier to communicate with workers when a business goes under new ownership, and give up to five million UK workers more freedom to change jobs by limiting non-compete provisions.”
Changes will also be made in the so-called transfer rules (employment protection), which govern what happens when employees transfer to other companies. Bureaucracy can also be reduced due to holiday pay.
Recent Comments