The Adam Smith Institute is a right-leaning think-tank which describes itself as

"the UK's leading innovator of free-market policies. Named after the great Scottish economist and author of The Wealth of Nations, its guiding principles are free markets and a free society. It researches practical ways to inject choice and competition into public services, extend personal freedom, reduce taxes, prune back regulation, and cut government waste."

It's intriguing to learn, then, that in its recent paper on deregulation, written by Tim Ambler of the London Business School and regulation expert Keith Boyfield, the institute comes out strongly in support of regulation directly at EU level where this is appropriate:

"We do not need both local and Whitehall governments tackling one topic, nor Whitehall and Brussels regulating one another. The concept of Directives (Framework Laws in the new Constitution) provides some national flexibility; but since flexibility is only additive (you can do more than the minimum demanded, but not less) Directives give rise to gold-plating. This adds to the burden on business in certain Member States, and means that the precise trading rules are different in each country, adding to the information burden on business. Accordingly, the UK government should press for EU legislation to appear as Regulations only, not as Directives."

This makes sense, of course. Regulations (laws) are directly applicable, while Directives (framework laws) are transposed by national governments. Where we need common rules for a common market, it's more sensible to agree one set of rules for the whole EU than to agree basic principles and then leave it up to individual countries to implement the principles in different ways.

Eurosceptics could learn much from these free-marketeers.

Download the full report here (PDF).