Reform UK has pledged to scrap the UK's existing GDPR framework and replace it with a lighter-touch system of data protection modelled on New Zealand as part of a wider package aimed at small businesses.
The party's Treasury spokesman Robert Jenrick is setting out the proposals as Reform seeks to reduce what it describes as regulatory burdens on entrepreneurs and technology companies.
Reform says the replacement regime would retain data-protection rules while imposing a less onerous regulatory framework than the current UK GDPR system.
Reform pledges to replace UK GDPR
Reform has said that, if it forms a government, it would replace UK GDPR with privacy legislation based on New Zealand's approach.
Jenrick argues that the existing framework has imposed unnecessary costs and bureaucracy on small businesses and technology companies.
He said GDPR had “strangled small businesses and tech firms alike” and argued that Britain should no longer follow privacy rules derived from European Union legislation a decade after the Brexit referendum.
Those claims about the economic impact of GDPR are Reform's assessment of the regulatory regime rather than an independently established conclusion.
UK currently retains its own GDPR framework
The UK GDPR is part of Britain's domestic data-protection framework alongside the Data Protection Act 2018.
Government guidance confirms that organisations using personal information must comply with data-protection principles governing matters including lawful and transparent processing, accuracy, security and how long information is retained.
The Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 subsequently changed parts of the UK's privacy framework but did not replace UK GDPR or the Data Protection Act.
Reform's proposal would therefore go substantially further by replacing the existing GDPR-based framework rather than amending individual provisions within it.
New Zealand model proposed
Reform says its replacement would be modelled on New Zealand's privacy regime, which the party describes as a lighter-touch approach.
The Financial Times reported that Reform characterised the New Zealand model as the lightest-touch regime still recognised by the European Union as providing adequate protection for personal data.
New Zealand nevertheless maintains statutory privacy protections and obligations governing the collection, use and disclosure of personal information.
Reform has not yet published full draft legislation setting out precisely which existing UK data rights, enforcement powers and obligations would be retained, removed or altered.
Labour warns over personal-data safeguards
Labour criticised the proposal, arguing that replacing GDPR could weaken safeguards protecting people's personal information.
A Labour spokesperson accused Reform of wanting to scrap protections for private data and described the plans as unworkable.
That is Labour's political assessment of Reform's proposal. The detailed effect on individual privacy rights cannot be established until the party sets out the full design of its proposed replacement regime.
Conservative Shadow Chancellor Sir Mel Stride also criticised the package and said there was insufficient detail about how Reform's proposed replacement for GDPR would operate.
Tax breaks for families investing in small businesses
The GDPR proposal forms part of a wider package of policies intended to encourage investment in smaller companies.
Reform says it would expand the Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme so that parents and grandparents could invest up to £250,000 in a qualifying business established by a child or grandchild while accessing the scheme's tax advantages.
The party says qualifying investors could receive a 50% income-tax rebate and an exemption from capital gains tax where the relevant conditions, including the required holding period, are met.
The Financial Times also reported that Reform proposes limiting potential civil liabilities for non-executive directors at smaller companies, while not exempting directors from criminal liability.
Reform builds wider small-business platform
The package adds to previously announced Reform policies including raising the VAT-registration threshold, reducing employer National Insurance costs in specified circumstances and removing income tax from overtime under its proposed “hard work bonus”.
Party leader Nigel Farage said small businesses had been damaged by taxation and regulation and presented the new measures as part of Reform's attempt to make Britain a more attractive place to start and grow a company.
Opponents have challenged the affordability and practical consequences of elements of Reform's wider economic programme.
The GDPR commitment nevertheless establishes a clear policy dividing line: Reform is now proposing to replace one of the central components of Britain's post-Brexit data-protection system rather than simply reform it.