Browse regulations

These regulations amend the Civil Legal Aid (Remuneration) Regulations 2013 to: (1) define 'online procedure advocacy services' for immigration and asylum cases, (2) impose 3-month waiting periods before barristers can apply for payments on account, (3) increase the payment on account rate from 75% to 80%, (4) introduce new fee tables (Tables 4(ca) and 8(ca)) for immigration/asylum online procedure advocacy services, and (5) revoke and replace earlier coronavirus regulations with transitional provisions preserving certain fee arrangements.

These regulations impose government price controls on legal aid remuneration, distorting the market for legal services. The 3-month restriction on payment applications creates unnecessary cash flow barriers for barristers providing legal aid. The regulation perpetuates a system of politically-determined pricing rather than allowing market forces to determine appropriate compensation for legal services. The transitional provisions lock in specific fee structures, preventing competitive adjustment. As with all price controls, these rules suppress supply, create monopolistic incentives for established providers, and reduce innovation in service delivery—all documented unintended consequences that harm both legal aid recipients and taxpayers.

Amends the Taking Control of Goods Regulations 2013 to temporarily increase the minimum net unpaid rent threshold for Commercial Rent Arrears Recovery (CRAR) from 276 days to 366 days during the 'relevant period' (COVID-19 pandemic response). Provides different thresholds depending on whether notice of enforcement or first taking control of goods falls before or after December 2020.

This was a COVID-19 emergency measure designed to provide temporary relief to commercial tenants during lockdowns. By 2026, the pandemic emergency has long passed, making this regulation obsolete. Government-mandated interference in private rental contracts during a crisis distorts market signals, creates moral hazard (tenants knowing enforcement is harder), and delays the natural economic adjustment that would otherwise occur. Emergency interventions that were justifiable in April 2020 have no legitimate purpose in 2026. Keeping such temporary measures indefinitely normalizes government override of contractual rights between landlords and tenants, undermining the rule of law in commercial relationships.

These Regulations amend the Employment Tribunals (Constitution and Rules of Procedure) Regulations 2013 and the Employment Tribunals (Early Conciliation: Exemptions and Rules of Procedure) Regulations 2014. Key changes include: (1) expanded eligibility for acting as Employment Judges by allowing relevant tribunal judges and relevant judges from other courts to serve under specified conditions; (2) creation of a legal officer cadre with authority to determine certain procedural matters; (3) amendments to early conciliation rules extending the conciliation period from one month to six weeks and allowing error correction; (4) various procedural refinements to tribunal rules including relaxed joinder provisions, modified hearing notice requirements, and electronic communication provisions.

The amendments are largely procedural efficiencies that marginally improve access and flexibility. Extending early conciliation from one month to six weeks and allowing error correction reduces friction. Legal officers handling routine procedural matters (extensions, amendments by consent, stays for insolvency) free Employment Judges for substantive matters. The cross-panel judge provisions address practical workforce management without expanding tribunal jurisdiction. The procedural changes to claims joinder and response filing are liberalizing. While early conciliation itself represents state-mandated pre-litigation, the specific amendments here reduce its burden. No evidence these changes cause harm sufficient to warrant deletion.

EU Exit regulations amending electricity network codes (2016/631, 2016/1388, 2016/1447) and electricity market regulation (EU 2019/943), removing EU institutional references, substituting UK-appropriate definitions, and revoking the EU Agency for Energy Regulators (2019/942). Primarily technical amendments to adapt retained EU law for post-Brexit UK operation.

This regulation perpetuates a complex, EU-designed regulatory architecture that was never subject to democratic scrutiny in the UK Parliament — inherited wholesale via the EU (Withdrawal) Act 2018. The network codes impose substantial compliance burdens on generators, demand connection facilities, and HVDC systems without evidence they deliver net benefits proportionate to their costs. Britain's energy sector would benefit from fresh, purpose-built UK regulation optimized for our specific market structure rather than patchwork amendments to inherited EU law. The revocation of the EU energy regulator agency is appropriate, but the rest merely tinkers with an ill-fitting framework rather than replacing it with a leaner, competition-friendly alternative.

These Regulations amend the Investigatory Powers Act 2016 to extend the oversight functions of the Investigatory Powers Commissioner to cover: (1) compliance by public authorities with the UK-US Data Access Agreement on access to electronic data for countering serious crime (dated 3 October 2019), and (2) functions exercisable under the Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Act 2019. The Commissioner must keep under review public authority compliance with these frameworks.

This regulation creates duplicative bureaucratic oversight for a bilateral agreement and an existing Act that already have their own compliance mechanisms. The UK-US Data Access Agreement was negotiated between two sovereign governments with their own domestic oversight; adding a third layer of Investigatory Powers Commissioner review imposes compliance costs on public authorities without commensurate benefit. The Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Act 2019 already contains its own operational framework — an additional oversight mandate merely adds administrative burden and potential delay to law enforcement data-sharing operations. Such oversight functions tend to expand over time, creating chilling effects on legitimate cross-border data transfers that are essential for countering serious crime.

Amendment to COVID-19 international travel regulations that removed Guadeloupe and Slovenia from the exempt countries list, added Singapore and Thailand, with transitional provisions for arrivals between July 10 and September 19, 2020.

COVID-19 travel restrictions were emergency measures that severely restricted international movement, devastated the travel and tourism industry, and represented unprecedented government control over personal liberty and commerce. The exemption system created arbitrary distinctions based on arbitrary thresholds, distorting travel decisions and harming businesses. These regulations have no place in post-pandemic Britain — they were always a temporary power grab that should never have been retained. The travel industry and international commerce cannot thrive under such官僚 control. The transitional provision demonstrates the complexity and confusion these rules created.

Amends the Official Controls (Plant Health and Genetically Modified Organisms) (England) Regulations 2019 to update references from EU Implementing Decisions to new EU Implementing Regulations (2020/885 on Pseudomonas syringae pv. actinidiae and 2020/1191 on Tomato brown rugose fruit virus), adds definitions for 'potential quarantine plant pest', modifies authorization provisions for activities involving plant pests, and makes technical amendments to related fee regulations.

Plant health controls preventing the introduction and spread of damaging plant pests like Pseudomonas syringae pv. actinidiae (affecting kiwi production) and Tomato brown rugose fruit virus (affecting tomato and pepper crops) serve legitimate purposes that market mechanisms cannot easily address. These pathogens cause severe crop losses affecting food prices and agricultural livelihoods. While the authorization system imposes compliance costs on researchers and breeders, deleting these regulations would leave England's plant health biosecurity with an inadequate legal framework, risking costly outbreaks that would ultimately harm British consumers and farmers. The amendments merely update retained EU law to reflect new scientific understanding and newer EU regulations, not introduce new restrictions.

The Electricity and Gas etc. (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020 is a technical amendment instrument that modifies multiple earlier EU Exit statutory instruments (from 2018 and 2019) primarily by replacing references from 'exit day' to 'IP completion day', updating references to the Electricity Regulation (EU 2019/943), omitting certain provisions, and inserting new articles regarding designated regulatory gas functions. It extends variously to England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland.

This instrument exemplifies the problem it purports to solve: a labyrinthine mass of amendment-upon-amendment that renders Britain's energy law nearly incomprehensible. Rather than reducing regulatory burden, it perpetuates thousands of pages of retained EU law with constant technical corrections that Parliament cannot meaningfully scrutinise. The regulation itself acknowledges this by omitting entire chapters (regs 84-103), yet leaves standing a complex framework of 'designated regulatory functions' and cross-references that restrict market flexibility. A dynamic free-trading Britain should replace this patchwork with clean, comprehensible domestic legislation that competitive markets require, not maintain an accretion of EU-derived amendments that require annual technical corrections just to function.

Transitional provision from the Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (Blackburn with Darwen and Bradford) (Amendment) Regulations 2020, which preserves the effect of the revoked 2020 coronavirus restrictions for offences committed before the new regulations came into force, ensuring continued liability under the old regime for past violations.

This transitional clause keeps emergency COVID-19 restrictions alive for pending prosecutions long after the pandemic emergency has passed. The original regulations have been revoked, yet this clause perpetuates legal uncertainty and the legacy of government-imposed movement restrictions. As a savings clause for a revoked emergency regime, it serves no ongoing public interest and represents bureaucratic inertia from Britain's COVID era that should be consigned to history.

This Remedial Order amends the Fatal Accidents Act 1976 to add 'cohabiting partner' as an eligible claimant category for wrongful death damages. It defines cohabiting partner as a person who was living with the deceased in the same household immediately before death, had done so for at least two years prior, and was living as a spouse or civil partner during that period. The Order also expands subsection (4) to allow multiple persons to claim under the new provisions.

This Order implements a court-mandated remedy correcting a prior incompatibility with the European Convention on Human Rights (Article 14 discrimination). Deleting it would leave an unequal legal framework that arbitrarily excludes cohabiting partners from wrongful death remedies while maintaining rights for married spouses and civil partners — a distinction that would likely result in successful legal challenges and costly litigation. While any regulation imposes costs, this extension of equal treatment under law addresses a specific judicial finding rather than expanding bureaucratic control over private arrangements.

This Order dissolves Poole Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and The Royal Bournemouth and Christchurch Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, transferring all property, liabilities, and statutory duties to University Hospitals Dorset NHS Foundation Trust on 1st October 2020. It contains standard TUPE provisions for employees, binding third-party lease provisions, continuation of instruments/forms/contracts deemed to reference the new entity, and transitions enforcement actions and licences accordingly.

This is purely administrative machinery for a NHS trust reorganization, transferring assets and liabilities between public entities. It imposes no regulatory burden on businesses, creates no restrictions on trade or competition, and introduces no new bureaucratic requirements. Without this order, the merger would create legal uncertainty and practical difficulties in property transfer, contract continuity, and governance. Britons would be worse off without it as essential administrative functions of healthcare delivery would be impeded. The order achieves its desired outcome (orderly dissolution and transfer) in the only way possible for this type of structural reorganization.

Amends speed limits on park roads to 20 mph in various royal parks, omits previous paragraph 2 speed provisions, and increases parking charges at Hyde Park, Regent's Park, and Greenwich Park from 35p/60p to 50p/70p per 15 minutes, with higher rates on Sundays and holidays.

These regulations impose government price controls on parking through arbitrary fee structures rather than market pricing, creating artificial scarcity and higher costs for park visitors. The speed limit reduction to 20 mph lacks evidence-based justification and reduces road throughput without clear safety benefit. As retained EU law never scrutinised by Parliament, these parking price-fixing provisions should be deleted to allow park authorities to set commercially reasonable fees or abolish parking charges entirely, letting market forces determine usage.

COVID-19 emergency regulations enacted September 2020 imposing business curfews (22:00-05:00 closure), seating requirements for on-premises food/drink consumption, and escalating penalties (£1,000-£10,000) for violations. Created Schedule 3 restricting restaurants, bars, cinemas, theatres, casinos, and other hospitality businesses. Amended multiple local tiered restriction regulations across England.

Emergency COVID regulations that forcibly closed or restricted legitimate businesses based on arbitrary hour restrictions and seating rules. Created uneven playing field (supermarkets exempt, restaurants penalized), imposed criminal penalties for operating outside mandated hours, and imposed compliance costs that destroyed viable businesses. These temporary pandemic measures are now obsolete (2026) and were never subject to proper parliamentary scrutiny — retained EU-style regulations inherited wholesale. The curfew logic was flawed: transmission risk is not inherently tied to closing at 22:00, yet thousands of businesses were shuttered, jobs lost, and wealth destroyed. Government should protect vulnerable populations, not mandate economy-wide business closures.

Amendment regulations to the Statutory Sick Pay (Coronavirus) (Funding of Employers' Liabilities) Regulations 2020, modifying the definition of 'in difficulty' for employer eligibility, adjusting claims procedures for HMRC reimbursement, and referencing EU General Block Exemption Regulation definitions for SME status. Made in response to COVID-19 to subsidize employer sick pay liabilities.

Temporary COVID-19 pandemic measure that should have expired with the emergency. Now obsolete as pandemic provisions have lapsed. Heavily references EU General Block Exemption Regulation (651/2014) which no longer governs UK state aid post-Brexit. Subsidizes employer sick pay costs, distorting labor market signals and creating administrative compliance burdens. The 'in difficulty' test based on EU collective insolvency concepts is an inappropriate foreign standard for British employers. Government subsidies for sick pay create moral hazard and suppress natural market adjustments in labor costs.

COVID-19 statutory instrument that extended temporary insolvency and governance deadline extensions from the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020, moving various 'relevant period' dates from September 2020 to December 2020 or March 2021 for measures including small supplier exclusions, moratoriums, winding-up petitions, and company meetings.

This regulation is both obsolete and harmful. The extended deadlines (Dec 2020, March 2021) have long since passed, making the regulation a historical artifact with no current effect. More fundamentally, it represents the problem of 'temporary' COVID insolvency measures that persisted too long, keeping zombie companies alive through government edict rather than market discipline. Such protections distort capital allocation, create moral hazard by signalling future bailouts, penalise well-managed competitors, and delay economic correction. The original 2020 Act was a emergency response to unprecedented shock, but the extension pattern demonstrates how emergency measures become permanent. Retained on the statute book with no sunset clause, these provisions reflect the paternalistic view that companies cannot fail without state tutelage — contrary to Britain's tradition of letting market forces clear malinvestments.