Introduction to the debate: How much regulation do we want or need?

Abstract

We in Britain have seen lots of headlines about over-regulation; for example, one headline reported Europe's top motor industries bosses telling the President of the European Commission that doing business in Europe meant extra costs because of 'increasingly dense, complex and often conflicting regulations'. So how much regulation do we want or need, for we also know that absence of or inadequate regulation can have serious consequences? We do not need to be reminded about what happened over thalidomide, or more recently over the presence of the red dye Sudan 1 in some foods.