This is the history of regulation in the UK following the 2024 election of the Labour Government led by Keir Starmer.
The UKCA (UK Conformity Assessed) Mark
Chris Grey reported as follows in September 2024:
Even more farcical, although, paradoxically, at the same time eminently sensible, is the latest retreat from the utter absurdity of the UKCA mark. Here too there has been a long history in delays to the date by which CE (Conformité Européenne) quality marks would cease to be valid, and UKCA would become mandatory. I discussed this issue in detail in August 2023, when the plan was “indefinitely postponed”. However, as I noted then, some products were not included in that, one case being construction products, where CE marks were still due to be phased out by the end of June 2025.
Last week, the government announced that this date would not apply and gave no other in replacement, suggesting that, for these products too, postponement is now indefinite. So far as I know, no such announcement has been made as regards medical devices, the other main area not covered by the 2023 indefinite postponement, with CE marking for these products due to come in by 2028 in some cases and 2030 in others. But I think it is all but inevitable that these will also be dropped.
UKCA was a particularly ludicrous piece of Brexit hubris, which has unravelled because in practice no one wanted it, and the country couldn’t afford it. In that sense, it is a metaphor for Brexit itself, albeit that, unlike Brexit, it proved easy to unravel by simply not doing it. Every time we see the CE mark on a product will serve as a reminder of that.
Regulatory Innovation Office
The RIO was launched in October 2024. This was probably good news, if a little over-hyped.
The first part of the headline of the accompanying press release suggested that the RIO would ensure that ‘Game-changing tech [will] reach the public faster’ as a result of the RIO’s activities. But ministers were not talking about programmes which would support the deployment of new technologies. (I would, for instance, love to see HMG offer advice to small and medium sized firms wondering whether, and if so how, to take advantage of recent developments in AI, and maybe robotics, drones …? But that is for another day, and maybe for another department: Business rather than Science)?
The second part of the headline admitted that the aim of the ‘dedicated new unit [would be to] curb red tape’. It would do this by working with other departments and regulators to address regulatory barriers to the growth of new technologies, including engineering biology, space, AI and connected/autonomous vehicles including drones. This sounded great but much would depend on the relations that develop between the RIO and the rest of government, including regulators. It would be an interesting test of how well individuals within the Starmer government (including officials) work across institutional boundaries.
To help this (?) the RIO would not be a free-standing (arms length) body but would form part of the Department of Science etc. and would incorporate the existing Regulatory Horizons Council and the Regulators Pioneer Fund.
Rather more worryingly, the RIO will also ‘set priorities for regulators which align with the government’s broader ambitions’. This has not always gone well in the past. The 2008 financial crisis was to a great extent caused by Prime Ministerially-encouraged light touch financial regulation, and building deregulation helped cause the Grenfell tragedy.
And also:- ‘[Today’s] announcement comes ahead of further plans to reduce the burden of red tape’. This is of course much easier said then done.
January 2025 - a Creaking British State?
Here's the current situation as it was seen by Chris Grey:
Right across the board, the British State is creaking under the weight of these demands, with underfunded, understaffed, and underperforming agencies. Examples ... include the Food Standards Agency, the Competition and Markets Authority, the Health and Safety Executive, and the Medical and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency. Now, and partly in response to this, the government has created the Regulatory Innovation Office, to update regulation and speed up decisions, with a particular focus on high-tech areas.
This may be no bad idea, including its recognition of the interconnectedness of some of these areas, but that also means that it sits astride a number of existing agencies, including some of those just mentioned. Arguably, that just adds another layer of organizational complexity and cost to an already creaking regulatory infrastructure. After all, there is something rather ‘Yes Minister’ about a kind of ‘regulator to regulate regulators’ in order to ‘cut red tape’. So, for now, the jury must be out on whether all this can possibly add up to the regulatory ‘nimbleness and agility’ promised by Brexiters in the past, and now embraced by Labour as part of its growth agenda....
The current government shows a proclivity to “flirt” with regulatory divergence whereas, in practice, its revealed preference … is to align with EU standards. This preference was further revealed by the government’s decision this week not to allow the ‘Stormont Brake’ to be pulled over chemical labelling regulations. This was the latest evidence that the government’s general approach will be to align the whole of the UK with any EU rules which apply, by virtue of the Protocol and Windsor Framework, to Northern Ireland.
The basic fact is “that the UK is a second-order regulatory power”, and always liable to be pulled by ‘the Brussels’ Effect’ towards EU regulations. This would be the case anyway, because so much of the UK’s trade and supply chains are bound up with the EU, but, as the story about chemicals labelling illustrates, Northern Ireland makes it more so. That’s because, at least as regards goods regulation, UK-EU divergence also has the consequence of GB-NI divergence, so to avoid the latter requires also avoiding the former.