Last week – not for the first time – arcane parliamentary procedure prevented me from speaking about an amendment I had tabled to Government legislation. While Conservative backbenchers were free to speak for hours about the very same private member’s bill they presented just 12 months ago (a ridiculous little Bill they had withdrawn when the Minister assured them the Home Office was already doing what they wanted) there was no time to even summarise the case for deleting a damaging clause on deregulation from the Enterprise Bill.

This Government is fixated with getting rid of regulation.  Ministers hate what they call ‘red tape’ - even though this often includes essential protections for workers and consumers, requirements to cut pollution, and safeguards for wildlife and the environment.

This obsession with deregulation is typified by the Government’s wish-list for EU reform and support for TTIP – the secretive EU-US trade deal which gives companies the right to sue governments if they pass regulations on health, food standards, environmental protection or consumer rights that might dent corporate profit.  

Deregulation is a core part of what Ministers are doing closer to home too.  My amendment was an attempt to stop the deregulation target (‘business impact target’ - first introduced in 2014) from being applied to the work of regulators such as Natural England and the Environment Agency.

It’s bad enough that this deregulation target already applies to Government departments. That means, for example, if the Department for Environment agreed to introduce a ban on microplastics, which are causing major pollution to our seas and harm to ocean life, it would have to find at least two regulations to scrap first!

That’s a crazy approach  - and the last thing we should be doing is extending it.  Nobody wants regulation for its own sake, but it’s simply wrong to assume all regulation is bad.  Just the other day, business secretary Sajid Javid noted that, according to the World Economic Forum, the UK has “the lowest burden of regulation in the G7”.

Even if you ignore the social and environment benefits of regulation (which is exactly what Ministers do), the opposite is often the case.  Regulation can drive innovation and efficiency, create new business opportunities, and provide a level playing field for enterprise.  

As a report for the Business Department itself concluded: “Regulations can have a positive impact on growth by removing certain market failures and improving economic efficiency.”

Applying deregulation targets to the work of regulators such as Natural England undermines their core purpose. It isn’t sensible, evidence-based law-making – it is dogma by diktat for dogma’s sake.

Back at EU level, UK Ministers are chief culprits when it comes to blocking environmentally, economically and socially beneficial regulation-  from stronger controls over banks and the financial sector, to better protection for communities and the environment against the risks of fracking.   

It’s thanks to EU regulations that our beaches are cleaner so we’re no longer swimming in sewage, and that rules are in place so developers can’t trash the UK’s most precious wildlife sites to make an easy buck.

That’s why, as part of the Green Party’s EU referendum campaign, we’re celebrating the benefits of sensible regulation - for workers, consumers, public health, and our environment. If we’re going to defeat TTIP and prevent this obsession with deregulation from undermining what we hold dear, we need to stay in the EU, work together, and fight for change.

And that’s why I’m backing Greens for a Better Europe - and I hope you will too.