This is amplified in a piece in the
Express which posits that "business owners" would have "lost 92 working days if they had attempted to read every regulation and directive handed down by the EU since 2010", another of Mr Elliott's stunning contributions to the debate.
Ironically, Elliott chooses for his red-tape "victim", John Biggin, managing director of Northampton based vehicle sales company TruckEast. He is roped in to say, "We are currently battling through a myriad of red tape in the form of European Union Whole Vehicle Type Approval (EUWVTA) ", adding that, "This nonsense has resulted in many small businesses folding".
Thus does Elliott say: "The EU has an addiction to red-tape that desperately needs to be tackled. No-one would argue that a single market needs some regulation to function properly, but the volume and frequency of new directives being generated is a serious restraint to British businesses".
Then we get the money quote: "This why I welcome the formation of the governmentâs EU Regulation taskforce and its drive to identify the EU's most pernicious business regulations. The forthcoming renegotiation with Brussels must focus on overhauling its approach to regulation, for the good of jobs and growth in Britain".
The irony, of course, is that Whole Vehicle Type Approval is a matter between the EU and UNECE, with the EU working on a programme of
international harmonisation which transfers lead regulatory authority to UNECE, as
this web site informs us, with the statement: "Only UNECE documents determine the applicable law".
"Business for Britain", of course, wants renegotiation and reform, rather than withdrawal but, as we
have seen, when it comes to a seat at the table, we need to leave the EU to get direct access to the World Forum for Harmonisation of Vehicle Regulations.
One might say, therefore, that this current initiative relies entirely on the ignorance of the likes of Elliott, of the media and then the public at large. There is no intelligence here, no understanding and no information. The arguments have not progressed and we seem frozen in time, rehearsing exactly the same issues of twenty years ago.
Meanwhile, the world has moved on, a fact to which the pundits seem oblivious. The EEA report, for instance, tells us that we need to stay in the EU, to give us "a strong voice in global agreements", which means, as with UNECE regulations, giving over our seat at the global negotiation to the EU. Nothing in the report recognises this, and nothing conveys any understanding of the way the global regulatory system works.
This actually accords with by broader experience. The top ranks of "industry" are most often filled by marketeers or bean counters. Neither have any feel for or understanding of regulatory systems, and their ignorance of EU structures and procedures is profound, with the role of global governance a complete unknown.
Thus to ask the likes of Marks & Spencer chief executive Marc Bolland, Heineken brand champion turned knicker salesman, is something of a joke. But then, the real action is going on
elsewhere and it is probably no coincidence that the EU is also running a red-tape cutting exercise. As long as the
media ignorance can be relied upon, these shallow, cynical initiatives can continue. In reality though, all we get tomorrow is another report to add to the collection.
COMMENT THREAD
Gathering dust on my bookshelf is a 217-page volume entitled "Review of the Implementation and Enforcement of EC Law in the UK", an "Efficiency Scrutiny Report" commissioned by the President of the Board of Trade. I suspect that the only significant difference between this and the report to be issued tomorrow is the date â mine is dated July 1993, almost exactly twenty years ago.