A Textbook Example Of EU Overregulation

A move to do away with outdoor heaters to combat climate change poses tremendous costs to Britain. In light of what it will accomplish, this is a textbook example of EU overregulation.


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A few weeks ago, I blogged about a long article in Der Spiegel describing how the EU is involved in a "tireless effort to regulate everything" - apparently oblivious to the tremendous economic costs and the impact on quality of life of such regulations. And today, the Daily Mail provides a textbook example of the EU in action.

The latest regulatory idea to come out of Brussels is to ban outdoor heaters "in order to tackle climate change." The fact that the carbon released by such heaters is so infitesimal - a total of .002 of one percent of Britain's total carbon emissions - as to have "no impact" on global warming is apparently besides the point. And apparently so is the economic impact of such regulations on the UK, where the cost to pubs, cafes and caterers of this regulation is estimated at a staggering £250 million a year in lost business. And since Britain has transferred to the EU the right to pass binding laws to combat global warming, Britain will have no choice but to comply with this new regulation once passed. The fact that the regulation makes no economic sense and will only detract from the quality of life in Britian matters not.

Read the article. As I noted here, the impact of the EU on Britan, of which overregulation is one aspect, portends to be economically opressive indeed.