'Brexit has freed us!' Half a million pages of 'bone-crushing' EU rules avoided since leaving bloc

The paperwork spans around 112 miles — which is same distance as six ferry journeys between Dover and Calais.

The new orders include regulations which could see drivers face rules controlling the speed of their windscreen wipers, while businesses are forced to produce plans to comply with the Paris Climate Agreement, or risk fines of up to 5 per cent of global revenue under the new Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD).

Responding to the findings, Shadow Foreign Secretary Dame Priti Patel told GB News: “Britain’s economy is tanking under the weight of Labour’s tax hikes and bone-crushing red tape. Yet Keir Starmer would have us believe it’s all down to Brexit rather than his own Government’s incompetence.

“The simple truth is that leaving the EU has freed us from mountains of burdensome regulations. But Labour refused to take advantage of it.”

Ms Patel fumed: “Labour’s attempts to take us into the EU by the backdoor are just another distraction from their own dreadful failings in Government. They should focus instead on getting our economy moving and getting Britain working again.”

Meanwhile, Chairman of the European Research Group (ERG), Mark Francois, said: “This very timely exercise by GB News, illustrates the sheer volume of EU law which we have avoided since we left, just six years ago.

“However, if Sir Keir Starmer’s ‘EU reset’, which includes ‘dynamic alignment’ (automatically following new EU laws in certain areas) goes ahead, all that advantage will be wasted, just because many Labour MPs are Europhile to their core.”

Analysis by the House of Commons Library shows UK taxpayers have saved up to £12.6billion a year since Westminster ended its contributions to Brussels.

However, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) says Brexit will leave the economy around 2.7 per cent smaller in the long term, despite the end of payments to the bloc.

Meanwhile, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) analysis warned savings from scrapped fees are small compared with lost trade, investment and productivity over the coming years.

In response, Reform UK Deputy Leader, Richard Tice, said: “This evidence further demonstrates that leaving the European Union was the best decision we could make as a country.”

“It’s given us the freedom to cut back on red tape and prioritise British businesses. We must not let this government roll back on Brexit, or everything we’ve gained will be lost."

Liberal Democrat Europe spokesman, Al Pinkerton, also told the People’s Channel: “Boris Johnson’s botched Brexit deal buried British business under two billion extra sheets of paperwork. That isn’t ‘taking back control’; it’s strangling growth with red tape.”

“As long as this Government refuses to reset our trading relationship with the EU, its growth strategy will remain anemic. A UK–EU customs union, as proposed by the Liberal Democrats, would cut the nonsense, back British exporters, and put rocket boosters under our economy.”

A UK Government spokesman said: “You see the cost of the last Brexit deal everywhere. Whether you're a British business, shackled by paperwork and red tape, or a family facing higher costs at the supermarket till. That is why we are getting a better deal to make Brexit work.

“We are focused on removing these barriers. Our UK-EU reset—including our food & drink trade and carbon linking agreement—is set to add nearly £9 billion a year to the UK economy by 2040.”

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