The armed forces eliminated 60 percent of the regulations in three years

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The Armed Forces have gone from having thousands of regulations to fewer than 500 regulations. The goal is to lower it further.

The many regulations under which the armed forces operated made it difficult to get a complete overview of the entire scope. Poor outlook also meant that many of the old regulations were not updated when there were new laws, orders, and requirements that the armed forces had to follow.

It is now coming to an end – everything has been collected and made available in the FOBID database. Thomas Voss says he and FERD are focused on streamlining and streamlining how regulations are administered in the armed forces.

– We’re getting a better and better overview and we see that the Armed Forces once had an incredible number of by-laws. The first numbers were many thousands, but when we began to distinguish between grammar and guideline text, the number dropped dramatically.

Voss is the head of the Regulations and Documents Department of the Norwegian Armed Forces, which was established on August 1 last year and consists of two departments: the Regulations and Legal Services (RE) Department and the Documents Management Department. and archives (DA). It is he who is assigned the responsibility of following up on the cleaning task.

Outdated regulations

Bylaws consist of instructions, directives, and regulations that must be distinguished from other types of documents such as technical manuals, guidelines, and policies.

Ultimately, the number was reduced to 1,054 regulations in 2020. In 2023, they temporarily reduced the number to 420, Voss says. This is a reduction of 632 regulations in three years. A whopping 60 percent.

– The theory says that reducing the number of regulations in itself is not a good measure of efficiency. It is about organizing what is necessary. In addition, it is important to see it in combination with other measures to achieve good regulatory management, says Voss.

old

Simen Egeberg, Head of the Legal Department, says the following about the business:

– We could go back to the fall of 2020. The number of regulations was high, and the quality of internal regulations was not as high as it should have been. Many of them were very old.

He prides himself on the work the operating units do, because they are the ones who have to review the regulations that apply to them, and report on what works and what doesn’t.

It’s hard to keep track of

Many of the regulations were outdated. However, Eggberg says this should not have any serious consequences for the Norwegian Armed Forces and personnel, but the many, and sometimes conflicting, regulations are hard to keep track of.

The opportunity exists when you have a large set of regulations. In terms of legal certainty, it is important to have a good body of regulation of good quality, with the aim of equal treatment.

Egeberg points out that the goal is to make it easier and better for users, so they can log in and get an overview in a safe and secure way.

– But there is still work to be done, and we have been working on it all spring and fall. The goal is to cut between 50 and 80 percent of Regulation 1054, Eggberg says.