Lorely Burt

My hon. Friend speaks clearly about the disproportionate burden of regulation on small and medium-sized businesses. Does he agree that we might wish to balance the amount of risk with the size of a business? By definition, a small business will not be able to generate the same sort of volume as a large one.

— from debate entitled “Economic Recovery and Welfare”

The three speeches/headings immediately before

  1. 1 earlier: John Thurso

    Absolutely, and one of the most pernicious things in our culture at the moment is the fact that people seem to have failed to understand that risk is made up of two factors. It is the severity of the consequence multiplied by the probability of its occurrence. If that consideration were applied properly, many of the risks that people are asked to mitigate, at great cost, might well not affect them. I will happily discuss what has happened in my businesses with the hon. Gentleman after the debate.

  2. 2 earlier: Gordon Banks

    There has been a lot of talk this afternoon about the number and value of regulations, but surely the point is that regulation must be measured against risk.

  3. 3 earlier: John Thurso

    Well, I would get rid of the regulations to do with the water directive, because of the impact that they have on whisky in particular; I would get rid of the sheep tagging regulations that are coming down the track and I would improve the system; and I would amend the slaughterhouse regulations to allow more British slaughterhouses to operate. The hon. Gentleman has succeeded in making me rise to my own fly, so I would not make a very good fish.

    Actually, the problem is not particular regulations or the number of them; it is the burden that regulations place on a business to undertake administrative functions for the Government. The real burden has come from all the matters that were dealt with by Government 15 or 20 years ago but now require form-filling and all sorts of other things by businesses. The real benefits can come from working out the impact of that burden.

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