ABSTRACT
Export controls received concentrated media attention during the Arms to Iraq saga played out in all its detail before the Scott Inquiry2 in 1996. The inquiry revealed a complex and detailed regulatory structure overseeing exports that lacked transparency, was of dubious legality and was subject to only weak parliamentary accountability. The focus of this chapter is on the command and control system of regulation over export control within the United Kingdom post the Scott Inquiry and the enactment of the Export Control Act 2002 which came into force on 1 May 2004. In the last annual Report on Strategic Export Controls (United Kingdom 2005; see also Taylor 2003), it was estimated for the year ended 2003, the value of exports of strategically controlled goods was £992.4 million. These exports make a significant contribution to the defence and security of the United Kingdom, as well as contributing to the multi-various international obligations to be met by the armed forces. In considering the regulation of strategic exports, an historical approach is adopted in drawing out the tensions between executive discretion and parliamentary controls. The main question addressed is how accountable is the new regulatory system? The main thesis advanced is that the system of export control is linked to the policy of the government of the day. In its early legal construct, it reflected the legal culture of the UK. Formally legalistic and highly structured in form, the actualité is of a pragmatic system that also reflects many of the strengths and weaknesses of a parliamentary system of ad hoc accountability. Thus the system of control is strongly driven by the government of the day, sustainable through political oversight and pragmatic decision-making subject to market forces. Party political decisionmaking is often interspersed with balancing different shades of multi-nationalism, especially in terms of the influences of the United States and Europe.
