I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I would like to start by thanking all hon. Members who have contributed to the scrutiny of the Bill, both in Committee and on Report. There has been considerable consensus and agreement on many of the measures, and I welcome the support from Members on both sides of the House for our doing everything we can to improve the environment for small businesses. It is a clear goal of this Government to make Britain the best place in the world to start and grow a business, and this Bill, the first of its kind, will make a significant contribution to that. Small businesses make a huge contribution to the UK, accounting for around half of UK jobs and a third of private sector turnover, and they are vital to our prosperity and to the UK economy.
The Bill strengthens and improves the way in which regulation is dealt with in government. We have introduced the one-in, one-out and the one-in, two-out approaches to regulatory management, and these have delivered over £1.5 billion of savings per year to businesses since January 2011. I am delighted that there has been support for enshrining the principles of transparent regulatory management in legislation through the regulatory reform measures.
The Bill makes significant inroads into improving the business environment for small businesses even further while also, crucially, providing new protections for the employees who lie at the heart of our recovery. For the
first time, we have addressed the abuses of zero-hours contracts. Despite Labour’s promises going back 20 years, no action was taken. Now, however, we have passed legislation to address exclusivity in zero-hours contracts.