Browse regulations

These Regulations amend retained EU rules on organic production and labelling by extending two deadlines: (1) the use of non-organic animals in organic production (extended from 31 December 2020 to 31 December 2022), and (2) the use of food additive E418 (extended from 1 January 2022 to 1 January 2023). They apply to England, Wales, and Scotland.

These are bare deadline extensions that perpetuate EU-derived regulatory constraints on organic production without making any substantive policy choice. They represent regulatory inertia rather than deliberate policy—merely pushing back restrictions that should either be permanently liberalised or removed. Post-Brexit, Britain should set its own organic standards policy rather than endlessly extending EU-derived transition periods. The underlying restrictions on non-organic animals and specific additives in organic production impose costs on producers and consumers alike, and these amendments avoid rather than address that fundamental issue.

This Order amends VAT legislation to create reduced (5%) and zero VAT rates for installation of energy-saving materials. It applies reduced rate to Northern Ireland (aligning with remaining EU VAT rules) and zero-rates installation in England, Wales and Scotland from 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2027. The Order defines 'energy-saving materials' (insulation, heat pumps, solar panels, etc.) and 'residential accommodation' for this purpose.

This regulation uses VAT manipulation to subsidize certain products deemed 'energy-saving' while taxing others, creating market distortions and picking winners. The time-limited nature (sunset clause to 2027) itself acknowledges this is artificial intervention that cannot stand on its own merits. Such tax preferences for specific technologies (heat pumps, solar panels) over others distort investment signals and represent regulatory capture opportunities. The administrative complexity of defining qualifying materials, distinguishing installation vs. supply, and applying different rules by geography (NI vs. Great Britain) imposes compliance costs that offset benefits. A genuinely free market would allow consumers to allocate resources according to their own preferences rather than HM Treasury's determination of what constitutes desirable 'energy-saving' goods. The regulation should be deleted and any environmental objectives addressed through direct, transparent mechanisms rather than hidden VAT distortions.

These Regulations extend the expiry date of certain Coronavirus Act 2020 provisions by six months (to September 2022), including: suspension of jury inquest requirements (s.30), expanded live link availability in criminal proceedings (ss.53-55 and Schedules 23-25), and statutory sick pay waiting period disapplication for Northern Ireland (s.43). They apply to England, Wales, and Northern Ireland.

Emergency COVID powers with built-in sunset clauses should expire as intended, not be repeatedly extended. These provisions include suspension of jury inquest requirements—a fundamental common law protection—and expansion of video/audio participation in criminal proceedings that bypass normal procedural safeguards. The regulation perpetuates emergency measures beyond their designed lifecycle without affirmative parliamentary justification, establishing a dangerous precedent of reflexive extension. Deleting forces proper parliamentary deliberation on which (if any) temporary measures merit permanent codification.

Amends the National Insurance Contributions Act 2014 to increase the Employment Allowance (a tax relief reducing employers' NICs liability) from £4,000 to £5,000 per year, effective 6 April 2022.

Deleting this regulation would revert the allowance to £4,000, increasing employers' National Insurance costs and raising the cost of hiring workers. Lower NICs on employment encourage job creation and wage growth—the very outcomes Adam Smith and the classical economists would endorse. Britons are better off with this higher allowance as it leaves more capital in businesses to invest, hire, and expand.

This Order adjusts excise duty rates and rebates on hydrocarbon oils, biodiesel, bioethanol, aqua methanol, road fuel gas, and related fuel products. It modifies liability to various duties and rebate rights by specified percentage adjustments via Tables A, B, and C, with cross-references to the Hydrocarbon Oil Duties Act 1979 and related Orders. Essentially a tax rate adjustment mechanism for fuel duties.

This Order perpetuates Britain's punitive tax regime on hydrocarbon fuels, which are essential economic inputs. High excise duties on road fuel, heating oil, and related products impose cascading costs throughout the economy, inflating transportation, manufacturing, and distribution expenses. The complex rebate structure distorts market signals by favoring certain fuel types over others based on political determination. Rather than adjusting rates within a flawed framework, this regulation should be deleted to allow genuine market pricing of energy. At minimum, full deletion would expose the administrative complexity of fuel duty bureaucracy and create pressure for fundamental reform.

This Order designates the Lord Advocate and procurators fiscal as prosecutors in Scotland for the purposes of section 19F(2) of the Extradition Act 2003, enabling them to initiate or pursue extradition proceedings under Part 1 of that Act. It extends to Scotland and came into force on 14th April 2022.

This is a narrow administrative designation that identifies existing legal officers (the Lord Advocate and procurators fiscal) for a specific statutory function. Deleting it would create a gap in the extradition framework, potentially preventing lawful extradition proceedings from Scotland. It imposes no regulatory burden, no gold-plating, and no restriction on commerce — it merely formalises who may act as prosecutors in extradition cases. Without this designation, the statutory scheme under s.19F could not function properly, leaving a legal vacuum in cross-border criminal justice cooperation.

These Regulations amend retained EU Council Regulation (EEC) No 95/93 on airport slot allocation. They reduce the 'use it or lose it' slot usage requirement to 70% for the scheduling period 27 March 2022 to 29 October 2022, and create COVID-19 related exceptions allowing airlines to return slots to the pool without penalty when government-imposed measures (travel bans, quarantines, border closures, etc.) severely reduce route viability. They also set enforcement thresholds at 30% for this period.

This regulation perpetuates government intervention in airport slot markets that was justified only by COVID-19, which is now obsolete. The reduced usage requirement to 70% allows incumbent airlines to hoard slots without using them, blocking new entrants and suppressing competition on key routes. Rather than allowing market prices and voluntary arrangements to allocate scarce airport capacity, this regulation props up established carriers at the expense of competitors who could use the slots more productively. The COVID-19 exceptions codified extensive government discretion over slot retention based on official measures, creating uncertainty and political risk in slot allocation. Post-Brexit Britain should be liberalising slot allocation, not retaining and expanding EU-era controls that distort aviation markets.

Amendment to the Education (Induction Arrangements for School Teachers) (England) Regulations 2012 that extends the deadline in regulation 8(1A) from 1st September 2021 to 1st September 2022, allowing extension of teacher induction periods before completion during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Coronavirus emergency measure that is now obsolete - COVID-19 disruptions to teacher training have long since resolved, and the temporary flexibility has no ongoing justification. Regulations with fixed expiration dates embedded in their text should not persist indefinitely as retained law. Keeping this adds unnecessary administrative complexity to the teacher induction framework with no corresponding benefit.

Sets maximum recoverable amounts for Returning Officers' charges at Northern Ireland Assembly elections: £1,750 for uncontested constituencies, with variable amounts for contested elections specified in a Schedule. Revokes and replaces the 2016 Order.

This Order governs cost recovery for electoral administration, not private market activity. Without it, there would be no predictable legal framework for returning officer expenses at Northern Ireland Assembly elections, potentially causing administrative chaos and exposing public funds to ad hoc claims. The amounts are modest caps on reimbursable expenses for essential democratic functions, not regulatory burdens on business.

The Customs (Additional Duty) (Russia and Belarus) Regulations 2022 impose additional ad valorem import duties on specified goods originating from Russia and Belarus, effective 25th March 2022. The regulations apply duties listed in the 'Russian Additional Duties Document' (v1.6) and 'Belarusian Additional Duties Document' (v1.7) to goods classified under commodity codes specified therein, on top of existing import duties under the Taxation (Cross-border Trade) Act 2018. Goods exported before the implementation date are exempt.

These regulations impose protectionist trade barriers that raise costs for UK importers, manufacturers, and consumers who rely on inputs from Russia and Belarus. While framed as a foreign policy response, such tariff measures distort market prices, reduce consumer welfare, and risk retaliation. The targeted nature of commodity codes suggests these goods have limited availability from alternative suppliers, meaning the additional duties primarily function as a supply-side shock that harms UK economic interests without meaningfully altering the calculus of authoritarian regimes. A genuinely free-trading Britain would resolve trade disputes through diplomatic means rather than escalating tariff warfare.

Post-Brexit statutory instrument amending food and feed safety regulations. Contains 21-month transitional grace periods for certain product requirements under the Quick-frozen Foodstuffs Regulations 2007 and Food Additives Regulations 2013, and substantive amendments to three EU regulations (178/2002, 1829/2003, 1831/2003) replacing 'United Kingdom' with 'Great Britain', 'imports' with 'entry', and transferring authorization powers from EU bodies to the 'appropriate authority'.

These amendments are necessary post-Brexit legal adaptations that maintain regulatory continuity while transferring authority to British bodies. The transitional provisions are self-limiting (21 months) and provide relief, not burden. Removing EU references and substituting 'Great Britain' is essential for legal clarity—deletion would create regulatory ambiguity harmful to business. The authorization substitutions create future deregulation potential by giving UK authorities rather than EU bodies prescribing power. Overall, this is a structural adaptation that enables future liberalisation rather than adding regulatory burden.

The Statutory Sick Pay (General) (Coronavirus Amendment) Regulations 2022 amended the Statutory Sick Pay (General) Regulations 1982 by modifying regulation 2(1)(a)(iii), omitting sub-paragraphs (c) and (d), omitting regulation 2(4), and omitting Schedules 1 and 2. The regulation came into force on 25 March 2022 and applied to England, Wales, and Scotland.

This regulation is explicitly a coronavirus emergency amendment from March 2022. COVID-19 pandemic-era regulations have been broadly repealed as the public health emergency has passed. Retaining this amendment creates regulatory clutter tied to a defunct emergency framework. The underlying Statutory Sick Pay (General) Regulations 1982 can function without these temporal coronavirus modifications.

These Regulations preserve the suspension of statutory sick pay waiting days for coronavirus-related illness beyond the expiry of section 40 of the Coronavirus Act 2020. They extend the 2020 Regulations' provisions (which waived the 3-day waiting period for SSP claims related to COVID-19) to cover periods of incapacity that began on or before 24th March 2022, effectively maintaining this emergency-era employer burden after the formal emergency framework has ended.

This regulation extends emergency COVID-19 era employer mandates well beyond their justification. By 2022, vaccines were widely available and the public health emergency had passed, yet this regulation artificially preserves increased SSP costs on employers. The suspension of waiting days increased employer liability during an emergency; maintaining it post-emergency simply prolongs this cost burden without justification. SSP waiting periods exist to reduce administrative burden for short absences; their suspension was never meant to be permanent. Deleting this returns SSP administration to standard rules and removes the coronavirus-specific employer burden now that the pandemic emergency has ended.

The National Minimum Wage (Amendment) Regulations 2022 amend the National Minimum Wage Regulations 2015 to increase the national living wage from £8.91 to £9.50 per hour, adjust rates for 21-22 year olds (£8.36→£9.18), 18-20 year olds (£6.56→£6.83), 16-17 year olds (£4.62→£4.81), apprentices (£4.30→£4.81), and accommodation offset rate (£8.36→£8.70), effective 1 April 2022.

Minimum wage laws are inherently harmful from a free-market perspective: they price low-skilled, young, and disabled workers out of employment opportunities by mandating wages above market equilibrium. The 6.6% increase in the national living wage will predictably reduce job opportunities for the most vulnerable workers, particularly youth entering the labour market. Such laws distort voluntary contracts between employer and employee, add compliance costs for small businesses, and represent the kind of government price-fixing that Mises identified as creating artificial shortages—in this case, a shortage of low-wage jobs. The stated purpose (protecting workers) is achieved only for those who remain employed while harming those who lose jobs or never get hired. A free Britain would trust workers and employers to negotiate wages based on productivity, not government decree.

Technical amendment Regulations updating Flood Reinsurance Scheme documentation from 2015 to 2022 scheme documents and reducing the scheme funding cap from £180 million to £135 million, while preserving all prior obligations and liabilities.

These Regulations merely update reference dates and modestly reduce the scheme funding cap. Deleting them would revert to the older 2015 scheme documents and restore the higher £180 million funding level, creating confusion and larger financial commitments. While Flood Reinsurance represents market intervention in the insurance sector, this amendment does not expand that intervention—it actually reduces the funding cap by £45 million. The transitional provisions preserving prior liabilities also prevent disruption to existing contractual obligations.