Businesses sweltering in a pressure cooker of red tape are being urged to take part in a survey to tell Gordon Brown which regulations they most want to see scrapped or amended.

The Chancellor has asked bosses to tell him which legislation, from Brussels or Westminster, is most unnecessary. In response leading business pressure group the Forum of Private Business (FPB), which represents 25,000 small firms, has launched an online survey on its website. The survey asks business owners which legislation is most outdated, damaging to competitiveness and poorly worded. The survey further asks how legislation could be simplified with clearer definitions, merging of two or more pieces of legislation or changes in applicability.

The FPB's Chief Executive Nick Goulding said he intended to present the survey to the Better Regulation Team at the Department of Trade and Industry.

"The Chancellor has laid down a challenge to business owners and we intend to take him up,' he said. "There has been an enormous amount of regulation since 1997 which is hurting small businesses - the lifeblood of the UK Economy. The malignant spread of red tape is undermining firms and this is a golden opportunity for small firms to tell Mr Brown in straight no nonsense terms where red tape is choking them."

* In a speech to business leaders in May the Chancellor called for a "culture change in government" as he outlined his Better Regulation Action Plan. He promised that a Bill next year would merge 29 regulators into seven as part of a drive to ensure businesses are inspected with "not just a light touch, but a limited touch". The Chancellor said the Government wanted to move away from the "old regulatory model". This involved "100 per cent inspection of premises, procedures and practices irrespective of known risks or past results". Instead the Government wanted to promote a new, "risk-based" approach to regulation, which would involve firms only having to submit to inspection when the costs could be justified.

"A risk based approach helps move us a million miles away from the old assumption - the assumption since the first legislation of Victorian times that business, unregulated, will invariably act irresponsibly," Mr Brown said. "The better view is that businesses want to act responsibly. Reputation with customers and investors is more important to behaviour than regulation. Transparency, backed up by the light touch, can be more effective than the heavy hand."

The Chancellor said that, in practice, the new approach would result in a 25 per cent cut in form-filling and inspections being cut by a third.

FPB BACKGROUND:

The Forum of Private Business (FPB) was formed in 1977 and is a pressure group fighting on behalf of private businesses. The FPB represents approximately 25,000 UK-based businesses employing in excess of 600,000 people, and is a powerful lobbying voice in both the UK and the European Union.

The FPB, as the only full UK member of UEAPME - the organisation that represents small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Europe - is the most prominent advocate of UK SMEs in Brussels and has a track record of positively affecting legislation prior to its introduction in the UK.

The FPB also provides a range of business services aimed at increasing member efficiency and profitability. Visit www.fpb.org