1. Regelrådet Kv. Garnisonen 103 33 Stockholm | www.regelradet.se Oscar Fredriksson January 2010
2. Swedish Better Regulation Council The work of the Swedish Better Regulation Council is intended to simplify day-to-day conditions for entrepreneurs in Sweden. The experience of other countries shows that an independent examination of all new and amended regulations provides a possibility of reducing unnecessary administrative burdens arising from regulations. The task of the Swedish Better Regulation Council is therefore to review proposals for new and amended regulations from ministries and government agencies that may have effects for enterprises. The remit of the Council is to focus primarily on the administrative costs resulting from a new or amended regulation and to examine the quality of the impact analysis. The Council is part of Government Action Plan for Regulatory Simplification.
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10. Contact Regelrådet, The Swedish Better Regulation Council Kv. Garnisonen SE - 103 33 Stockholm e-mail: [email_address] website: www.regelradet.se Tel. +46 8 405 10 00 ( switchboard)
Editor's Notes
Regelrådet’s mission is to give an opinion on whether new and amended regulations have been formulated so as to achieve their purpose in a simple way and at the lowest possible administrative cost to businesses. Regelrådet shall also assess the quality of the impact assessment. As far as possible Regelrådet shall also assist Government-appointed committees of inquiries in drafting impact assessments.
Regelrådet is to meet with sufficient frequency to be able to deal with the legislative proposals submitted to it and to issue opinions within the stated consultation period often within two weeks from when the proposal was submitted to Regelrådet. Budget 2010, £ 1 million Regelrådet will operate until 31 december 2010. It is though likely that Regelrådet will continue to exist. If not I think it would be a waste of resources and competence.
Several proposals have concerned cases outside Regelrådet’s mandate. Regelrådet has met with some regulators for open and friendly discussions on their work on regulations.
Regelrådet is organised as a committee of inquiry and is thus a small independent authority. Its predecessor the Simp-Lex unit, was placed within the Government offices, at the Swedish Ministry of Enterprise and was not an independent body. In combination with an unclear mandate and scarce resources the Simp-Lex unit never became a success. There was at the time no obligations for for example the Agencies to send their proposals for new or amended regulation and impact assessments to the Simp-Lex unit. The requirements on carrying out impact assessments were also less clear. Independence is also important to the EU. The Commission’s Impact Assessment Board should as a consequence be organised as an independent body outside the Commission. It is obvious that there are different opinions on this. The position paper which has been created by Regelrådet, Normenkontrollrat, Actal and RPC, and last week was sent to the president of the commission, Mr Barroso, will hopefully persuade the Commission to establish an independent watchdog.
