Boris Johnson discusses new trade deal with Australia

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The Prime Minister commissioned a special task force to explore ways in which the UK could take advantage of its new regulatory freedoms to stimulate business dynamism. Chaired by former Tory party leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith, The Taskforce on Innovation, Growth and Regulatory Reform delivered its conclusions on Tuesday. The group claimed that Brexit offered a “one-off opportunity” to create a new regulatory framework to encourage innovation, growth and inward investment.

The task force authors called on the Government in particular to tear up EU data protection laws, as well as making it easier for pension funds to invest in fast growing tech companies.

They argued that the EU’s “precautionary principle” was stifling UK businesses and should be replaced with a British “proportionality principle.”

The “precautionary principle” is written into EU law and is a wide-ranging approach to regulating innovation.

Critics have branded it as unscientific and reactionary.

In an op-ed for the Daily Telegraph, the task force members wrote: “In an age of extraordinarily fast technological change, the freedom to set our own regulatory standards offers huge opportunities.

“As the EU has expanded, its internal processes have become slower and more bureaucratic and its approach to the ‘Precautionary Principle’ has become an excuse for neglecting the role of regulation in economic competitiveness.

“With the power to create our own laws, we can lead globally on standards and build a regulatory system which supports innovation and competition.”

Responding to the group’s proposals, Mr Johnson reiterated his belief that UK entrepreneurs and innovators could “lead the world in the economy of the future.”

He added: “This can only happen if we clear a path through the thicket of burdensome and restrictive regulation that has grown up around our industries over the past half century.”

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Earlier this week, the Prime Minister sealed the deal on a new trade agreement between the UK and Australia.

The agreement is the first bespoke trade deal signed by the UK since leaving the EU.

The pact will cover British goods such as cars, Scotch whisky, biscuits and ceramics.

The Government views the deal as an important step towards the UK joining the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTTP).

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