Vince Cable turns off raft of retail red tape

Redundant legislation such as the war-time Trading With The Enemy Act, and rules around the safety of pencils and prams will also be abolished.

The age limit for buying Christmas crackers will be reduced from 16 to the European minimum of 12.

Business groups welcomed the drive to cut red tape, but called on ministers to do more to tackle "big regulatory burdens" as well as "tinkering" with smaller ones.

Business Secretary Vince Cable announced that 130 of the 257 regulations covering retail firms will be scrapped, and a further 30 will be simplified as part of the government's "red tape challenge" which will eventually study more than 20,000 regulations across British industry.

The minister agreed that governments had often announced action against red tape, but he maintained that the current drive would achieve results quickly, and on a large scale, freeing firms from burdens and making it easier for them to do business.

"We have struck a balance between keeping regulations necessary to protect consumers, the workforce and the environment, while rolling back the number of rules and regulations our businesses have to deal with.

"We have heard these promises by successive governments before, but these first proposals from the red tape challenge show that we're serious and we are making real progress."

The government has decided not to change legislation covering Sunday trading and to keep in place other rules covering areas such as hallmarking of goods.

Mr Cable said some of the most ridiculous regulations he discovered included the poisons licensing system, which covered the sale of low risk products such as fly spray and toilet cleaner.

The requirement on retailers to notify TV Licensing about sales of televisions will also be scrapped, while rules on the sale of car tyres will be simplified.

Business minister Mark Prisk said he hoped that by scrapping or simplifying regulations covering the retail industry, firms will start to see a difference to their bottom line.

David Frost, director general of the British Chambers of Commerce, said: "Ministers have acknowledged that reducing the burden of regulation on business is essential to supporting economic growth.

"But we question how these incremental changes will deliver real change on the ground at a time when the government is introducing more big ticket regulation, for example around parental leave and flexible working. If we're to see real economic growth in the UK, deregulation can't be derailed by new and costly laws."John Walker, chairman of the Federation of Small Businesses, said: "We welcome the announcement to cut red tape in the retail sector as the start of an effort to look more broadly at regulation in all areas, but we urge the government to deal with the big regulatory burdens.

"Some of these regulation cuts will have no tangible impact on small firms at all as they are unused."

Colin Borland, the Federation of Small Businesses' head of external affairs in Scotland, said: "Over 60 per cent of our members have seen the cost of regulation increase in the last four years. On average, compliance now costs them 5 per cent of their annual turnover. Thus, any announcement that outdated, irrelevant regulations are to be scrapped is to be welcomed.

"Of course, this announcement relates only to those regulations which come from Westminster and many of the rules which have really affected Scotland's small retailers in recent years have come from the Scottish Parliament - alcohol licensing being the prime example."