By Kim Tae-jong

The Federation of Korean Industries (FKI) said Monday that it will strengthen the validity review on bills proposed by lawmakers to regulate business here, arguing “too many laws” hamper business.

The lobbying group of the country's large businesses said it signed a memorandum of understanding with the Korea Society for Regulatory Studies (KSRS) for the cooperation to review whether lawmakers’ bills to regulate business are proper.

“There have been many cases in which lawmakers proposed bills to make a new law or strengthen existing rules to regulate business, but there is no measure to review whether such bills are valid or not,” an FKI official said.

The move is the first of its kind as there is no organization to check the validity of bills proposed by legislators.

The FKI said lawmakers in the newly-opened 19th National Assembly proposed so many new bills on May 30 and 31, half of which were aimed at strengthening regulations or legislating new ones to regulate business.

In the 18th Assembly, about 2,000 bills were proposed to strengthen regulations or legislate new laws to regulate business and over 90 percent of them were proposed by lawmakers, the lobby group said.

Although the bills proposed by the government are reviewed twice by related government agencies and the Regulatory Reform Committee led by Prime Minister Kim Hwang-sik, those by lawmakers are not subject to any reviews for validity, the FKI official said.

“We are all aware of the sensitivity of this issue and will take a very careful stance, but this will be very meaningful ahead of the presidential election later this year because so many bills for regulations are expected to be proposed,” he said.

Citing a related survey, the FKI said excessive regulations against business have worsened corporate business activities and management.

In a survey of 55 CEOs and 800 people in May, about 90 percent of the former group said business spirits have been worsened while about 50 percent of the latter said the same.

As the main reason for this, about 40 percent of the CEOs citied regulations, followed by anti-market sentiment by about 30 percent. About 30 percent of the others asked picked challenges in the global market while some 25 percent said anti-market policies.

Meanwhile, the KSRS also expects the move will help upgrade legislation procedures.

“This would be a first big step to support lawmakers, although there have been demands for validity checks on bills that regulate business,” the group said.

The KSRS will set up a new committee to regularly monitor bills proposed by lawmakers in association with the FKI.