Currently there exists an enormous regulatory burden facing business which is stifling its capacity to grow and employ.

The Queensland economy is losing up to $17.9 billion as businesses struggle to comply with 70,000 pages of State legislation, the highest by far of any state in Australia.

Chamber of Commerce & Industry Queensland has released its Blueprint for Fighting Queensland's Over-Regulation, which reveals that excessive red tape is significantly impeding the Queensland economy. This Blueprint was forwarded to all Queensland Federal and State politicians, as well as all Queensland Mayors.

• Blueprint for Fighting Queensland's Over-Regulation (PDF)

Queensland has 10% more pages of regulation and statutory rules than the next highest state in Australia (Western Australia – 63,567 pages) and significantly more than both New South Wales (40,417 pages) and Victoria (56,839 pages)

Accordingly:

• 80% of businesses surveyed have been significantly or moderately impacted by red tape
• 25% spend more than 20 hours per week on compliance
• over the past two years, more than 80% of respondents have observed an increase in the cost and time it takes to comply with regulations
• two-thirds of businesses surveyed believed that government regulation had prevented them from making changes to grow their business.

Inappropriate and inefficient regulation is a major constraint on business growth, productivity and investment and is reducing Queensland's competitiveness at a time when Queensland's economy is combating global and economic challenges and unlike all other states is in economic decline.

The difficulty with red tape is that while each individual regulation can normally be justified by Government as being in the public interest, when we sum all these individual regulations together it creates a staggering regime that essentially blunts business from growth and employing.

The challenge

CCIQ challenges the State Government to move beyond rhetoric and deliver on their commitment to regulatory reform as opposed to growing the regulation burden.

For example, the 2008-09 State Budget and Premier's Towards Q2 Statement have previously committed to addressing this issue yet in 2008-09, 19 new acts and 3117 pages of new and amended legislation were introduced in our State. Our regulatory burden is in fact growing by 5% each year.

Problem areas include the time required to comply with paying taxes; environment requirements; employing workers; business licences, permits and renewals; building approval and amendments; and starting a business.

Working with the State Government

CCIQ wishes to work with the State Government to lower the compliance costs of regulation and has accordingly recommended a seven point action plan for Regulatory Reform including:

• Appoint a Minister for red tape reduction
• Systematically go about reducing the 70,000 pages of regulation by setting achievable but challenging targets for reduction
• Publicly report regulatory reform measures and progress against the target on a regular and ongoing basis
• Ensure adequate communication and consultation with the business community
• Improve Government customer service by setting "business relevant" targets for outcomes and service quality

With unemployment levels imposing an enormous social and economic cost on our community, the State Government in particular must have a genuine and harder look at the sustainability of this level of regulation.

Further information

Further information is available by contacting CCIQ's Policy team on 07 3842 2267 or by email to policy@cciq.com.au.

Have your say

CCIQ is seeking feedback from members on how over-regulation and red tape is impacting Queensland businesses. Email us at policy@cciq.com.au.

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Contact t: 07 3842 2267 | e: policy@cciq.com.au | w: www.cciq.com.au