Guidance

How the Regulatory Policy Committee scrutinises impact assessments

Guidance on the high level recommendations the RPC use when scrutinising impact assessments

• From: Regulatory Policy Committee
• Published: 12 July 2011
• Last updated: 29 May 2014 — See all updates

Documents

Regulatory Policy Committee: recommendations used when scrutinising impact assessments

HTML

Details

The Regulatory Policy Committee (RPC) provides its external, independent scrutiny of new regulation through the government decision-making process.

Regulatory proposals are accompanied by an impact assessment (IA), which assesses and estimates the likely costs and benefits, as well as presenting the associated risks, of a regulatory proposal that has an impact on business, civil society organisations, the public sector or individuals. Following scrutiny of an IA the RPC provides an opinion on the quality of analysis and evidence presented in the IA. The RPC bases its opinions on a wide range of material, including additional information provided by government departments and other stakeholders. Some of this additional material may be confidential and/or sensitive and cannot be shared more widely. The RPC opinion informs the decisions of ministers as to whether or not they should proceed with the proposal.

The RPC assesses impact assessments against well established guidance set out by HM Treasury’s Green Book, and the Better Regulation Framework Manual. To provide further clarity the Committee has set out 7 recommendations based on the common themes emerging from the scrutiny of IAs.

Published 12 July 2011
Last updated 29 May 2014 + show all updates

1. 29 May 2014

   Clarified expectations in relation to issues of public risk

2. 12 July 2011

   First published.