Public sector
Reform UK's leader proposes 'light-touch' alternative, although rival politicians say plans are sparsely detailed and inconsistent with reality
Reform UK says it wants to scrap the UK GDPR after eight years of the regulations “strangling” small businesses.The party’s leader Nigel Farage and economy chief Robert Jenrick announced additional pledges on Tuesday evening, which include scrapping the UK’s data protection regulation for a “light-touch” alternative more akin to New Zealand’s approach.The UK’s Information Commissioner has powers to issue multi-million-pound fines to businesses that violate UK GDPR, which in 2021 replaced the pre-Brexit Data Protection Act 2018.
New Zealand’s equivalent, however, only has the power to issue fines up to NZ$50,000 under its Privacy Act 2020. The legislation is weaker in some areas compared to the UK GDPR, but imposes similar restrictions on handling and transferring data.
Building a more prosperous business environment features heavily among Reform UK’s policies, we're told. “Small businesses are the beating heart of our economy, yet they have been suffocated by years of punishing taxes, suffocating EU red tape and a big-state obsession that rewards dependency over hard work,” said Farage via news wire PA.“While the establishment parties drive small firms to the brink of closure, Reform UK is offering a bold, common-sense rescue plan.”Jenrick added: “GDPR has strangled small businesses and tech firms alike in a web of unnecessary regulation. “Ten years after the Brexit referendum, we should not still be following ridiculous EU privacy laws that hurt British businesses.”“For decades governments have focused on big corporations while leaving small businesses to fall by the wayside. No more,” Jenrick added. “Reform UK believes the 6 million small businesses in the UK are the backbone of our high streets and our economy, and we will back them to the hilt.”The UK must keep an active adequacy decision from the European Union so that personal data can flow freely across borders without extra legal hurdles. Any plans to diverge from EU data protection law in a major way could jeopardize the adequacy decision.The Reform UK party itself is currently embroiled in a data protection-related legal battle brought against it by the Good Law Project, which claims Farage's party failed to comply with current UK GDPR.The campaign group sued Reform UK in March 2025 after it claimed the party was refusing to disclose to people the data it stored about them and failing to respond to requests to delete that data.
