The Business Council of Australia has released a paper titled Improving Australia’s Regulatory System, which provides a comprehensive set of actions for improving the regulatory system.

The paper highlights opportunities to improve the administration of the law, noting that while key regulators must be independent, they must also operate in an environment with incentives to better understand business and minimise regulatory burdens, including those arising from delays and uncertainty.

The paper calls for four actions that should be implemented as a priority:

• legislating the mandatory preparation of Regulation Impact Statements
• legislating a new performance and accountability code for all major regulators, including the establishment of an Inspector-General of Regulation
• requiring any regulation which imposes a significantly increased red tape burden to have an equivalent offsetting red tape reduction within the same portfolio
• productivity payments from the Commonwealth to the states for good regulation performance.

The paper also includes a number of other recommendations for governments to adopt which focus on stopping the flow of poor regulation, the performance and accountability of regulators, and reducing the stock of regulation.

Improving Australia’s Regulatory System