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Red Tape Council
May 2026 Chair’s Letter: Permits, Evidence and the Cost of Waiting
Dear members,
This month, our work moved from gathering evidence toward asking what a fair, usable standard could look like. That shift matters. A permit is not an abstract procedure when a business is waiting to open, expand, or complete work. A delay has a calendar, a cost, and a person trying to keep everything else moving while the answer does not arrive.
Our purpose is not to assume that every rule is unnecessary, or that every delay has the same cause. It is to make the effects on small businesses visible and to ask public bodies for processes people can understand: clear steps, published service times, a digital route that works from start to finish, and a defined response when a deadline passes.
What moved this month
On 5 May, Reseated opened its pledge programme for businesses. On 12 May, the Platform Council’s PL-001 issue passed all five parts of the pattern test: Volume, Frequency, Consistency, Spread and Corroboration. That is a useful reminder that the Assembly’s method is intended to distinguish a recurring practice from a single difficult experience.
On 13 May, the Red Tape Council wrote to the World Bank’s B-READY team and offered our Days to Open survey as a source of practical evidence. The offer connects our member reports to a larger question: how do public services work in practice for the people who have to use them? The World Bank’s B-READY 2025 findings cover 101 economies and report that public-services scores average around 23 per cent below regulatory-framework scores.1
On 19 May, the UK Late Payments Bill was introduced in the House of Lords. It concerns a different council’s work, but it belongs in this month’s wider picture: small businesses often have to plan around decisions and processes controlled by others. On 26 May, the Platform Council circulated a draft Fairness Standard for consultation. That is a draft, not an adopted rule. It will be tested in public before members vote.
For our own council, the two practical campaigns remain Days to Open, which compares permit experiences across 30 cities, and Permit Timer, which asks for the time taken by each step to be recorded and published. Our March open letter to mayors and city executives asked them to publish permit times. The May offer to the B-READY team is another way of making the evidence useful beyond our own membership.
Where the numbers stand
As of 27 May, Reseated had 759 members in 49 countries and had received 1,980 reports from 50 countries. The Red Tape Council had 49 members in 27 countries and 79 permit reports from 30 countries. The median amount at stake in those reports was approximately US$5,184. Twenty-five reports had arrived in the previous 30 days.
The country figures matter, but so does the range of people doing the reporting. In our Red Tape membership, 41 per cent work alone and 39 per cent work in teams of two to nine. Another 16 per cent work in teams of 10 to 49, and 4 per cent in teams of 50 to 249. A process that is merely inconvenient for a large organization can absorb a substantial share of one person’s working week when there is no dedicated administrator to follow it.
Reports came most often from the United States (14), India (11), Brazil (9), Canada (5), the United Kingdom (5), Argentina (3), Germany (3) and Vietnam (3). These figures do not tell us that every city or authority behaves alike. They tell us that permit problems are being reported across different places, and give us a basis for asking more precise questions.
One account, and what it teaches us
She has completed the application steps she can see, but cannot tell whether the file is still being reviewed, whether something is missing, or when she should expect an answer. She has no published service time to plan around and no clear point of contact to resolve the uncertainty. The difficulty is not only the wait. It is being unable to tell what the wait means.
Publishing service times, confirming receipt, and showing the next step would not guarantee that every application is approved. They would let applicants make decisions on the basis of something more solid than silence.
What we are learning
First, evidence has to be specific enough to support a fix. “Permits take too long” is a starting point, not a complete diagnosis. We need to know where time is spent, what applicants are told, what can be completed digitally, and whether an application is delayed for a reason the applicant can address.
Second, one-stop service should mean one usable route, not simply a webpage that sends a person elsewhere. Members’ time is a real resource. Repeatedly finding the right office, uploading the same information, or checking for an unannounced status change transfers administrative work from the institution to the applicant.
Third, any deadline for a response must be designed carefully. Our proposed “silence is consent” principle is an important question for consultation, not a magic phrase that can be applied without regard to public safety or the kind of permit involved. We will need to define where it is appropriate, what exceptions are justified, and how applicants are informed. The goal is a fair, predictable process—not a shortcut around legitimate safeguards.
What comes next
From 2 June to 2 July, the Platform Council will consult on its draft Fairness Standard. Members are welcome to follow that consultation and consider how its process applies to our own work.
On 23 June, the Cashflow Council is scheduled to consider whether its issue meets the five-part pattern test.
On 27 June, Reseated will mark United Nations Micro-, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises Day. The UN estimates that MSMEs represent about 90 per cent of businesses, 60–70 per cent of employment and around half of global GDP.2
For the Red Tape Council, our immediate work is to keep improving the quality of permit evidence: which step caused the delay, what information was available, how long the wait lasted, and what change would have made the process more workable. We will share the next stage when the evidence and process are ready.
Thank you to the members who took time to send evidence, check figures, and make the practical consequences of administration legible.
Thank you, too, to everyone who has kept reporting even when the experience feels routine. Repetition can make a bad process seem inevitable. It is not inevitable simply because many people have learned to work around it. Our task is to show the pattern, test a proportionate fix, and give decision-makers something concrete they can adopt.
With appreciation,
Edna AssunçãoChair, Red Tape CouncilSão Paulo, Brazil