Reform UK pledges to scrap GDPR and replace it with New Zealand-style privacy rules
Key Points
- Reform UK pledged to abolish the UK GDPR and replace it with a New Zealand-style privacy law.
- Robert Jenrick said GDPR has strangled small businesses and tech firms in unnecessary regulation.
- The party said the New Zealand model would preserve the UK's EU data adequacy status.
- New Zealand's Privacy Act gives people fewer data rights than the EU GDPR.
- Labour called the plans unworkable and unserious, and the pledge is opposition policy only.
Reform UK said it would abolish the UK GDPR and replace it with a light-touch privacy law modelled on New Zealand’s Privacy Act.
The party set out the pledge on Tuesday night (25 August) as part of a wider package aimed at small businesses, with Treasury spokesman Robert Jenrick unveiling the plans in full on Wednesday (26 August).
“GDPR has strangled small businesses and tech firms alike in a web of unnecessary regulation,” said Jenrick.
“Ten years after the Brexit referendum we should not still be following ridiculous EU privacy laws that hurt British businesses,” he added.
“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 Nigel Farage, leader of Reform UK.
Reform UK pointed to several claims in support of the change, including:
- GDPR cut tech investment by around 25% compared with US competitors
- The number of new apps on the Google Play Store halved after the rules took effect
- Simply listing the email addresses of potential business customers can trigger legal obligations under the current regime
Adequacy and data rights
Reform UK said the New Zealand model would preserve the UK’s EU data adequacy status, which allows personal data to move freely between the UK and the EU. The European Commission grants adequacy only to countries offering protection it judges essentially equivalent to the EU’s own standard.
New Zealand’s Privacy Act gives individuals a narrower set of rights than the EU GDPR, which includes the right to be forgotten.
The UK wrote an amended version of the EU regulation into domestic law after Brexit, and has already moved away from Brussels through the Data (Use and Access) Act, which became law in June 2025 and relaxed parts of the UK GDPR in the name of economic growth.
Reform UK sits in opposition, so the pledge carries no legal force unless the party forms a government.
