Annex C: Better Regulation
- The Department is fully committed to the Government's 'Better
Regulation' initiative and to the five principles of good regulation
- transparency, accountability, targeting, consistency, and proportionality.
- A key feature of the Better Regulation initiative is the reporting
of departmental regulatory activity; the Department reports on its activity
to Cabinet Office monthly, six-monthly and annually. The Department is
not a major regulatory department. During 1997/98, the latest year for
which full information is available, the Department introduced 57 Statutory
Instruments, the majority concerning rules of court and legal aid. Of
these, 47 amended or repealed existing regulations. In the nine months
to December 1998, the Department introduced 47 Statutory Instruments.
None of the regulations introduced placed an unnecessary burden on business.
- The Department continues to seek to ensure that going to court, when
necessary, is as easy and as inexpensive as possible. This includes providing
all court users with clear information about what happens when they do.
As part of its Better Regulation programme, the Department continues to
simplify and improve the forms which service users have to complete. As
a result of the 1997/98 review, of about 1,250 forms in existence, 14
forms were simplified or abolished. In 1998/99 the Department reviewed
nearly 900 forms: abolishing 91 forms and simplifying or replacing over
400 forms. The Department participates in the Direct Access Government
programme: the Court Service has placed a wide range of information helpful
to business and other service users on the Internet.
- In August 1998 the Cabinet Office introduced the new procedure of Regulatory
Impact Assessment (RIA), which replaced Compliance Cost Assessment (CCA).
RIAs are designed to help ensure that there is more emphasis on identifying
and publishing the costs and benefits of proposed regulations (including
non-business) costs, looking at who is affected, and looking at any non-regulatory
approach which might be sufficient. Copies of the Better Regulation Guidance
were sent to senior managers throughout the Department and staff involved
in developing policy. Staff from the department's policy divisions and
the Unit responsible for promoting Better Regulation within the Department
attended a course on the new procedure. A RIA about the proposal in the
Access to Justice Bill to make the success fee and indemnity premium recoverable
in conditional fee cases is available to the public and was sent to the
libraries of both Houses of Parliament.
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