There are good reasons for these frustrations. In Europe, and to a lesser extent globally, three big regulatory trends are at play.

Two of these add to the burden for businesses, the third mitigates the effects of the first two.

Perhaps most burdensome has been the increase in environmental protection legislation. Noone would argue that this is unnecessary and some ideas are eminently sensible (carbon taxes, which price in the full economic cost of production of goods and services, are one example), but whether green laws are justified or not, they make life more difficult for firms.

Health and safety is the second major source of new rules. In a world that is becoming increasingly riskaverse it sometimes appears as if there is an effort to legislate away every danger that life throws up. Again, because it is hard to argue against more stringent rules to prevent accidents and the like, business lobbyists are left fighting rearguard actions to prevent the wilder (and costlier) ideas making it into law.

The third big trend in regulation offsets the first two, at least partly. As concerns have grown about competitiveness in an increasingly economically integrated world, politicians and policy-makers have been compelled to think longer and harder about how their actions can hobble wealth creators.

As a result, governments almost everywhere have become more businessfriendly and, with the exception of the areas mentioned above, deregulation has helped make life easier and cheaper for companies operating in competitive markets.

Against this backdrop, how does Ireland compare with its competitors when it comes to regulation?

The Republic has a reputation for light-touch regulation, but this is not fully deserved. While it is true that Ireland does not rush to regulate, it is also very slow to deregulate in the areas where cutting controls is needed.

Positively, the Irish systems displays neither the meddling instincts of statist Europeans, mostly in the southern part of the continent, nor the excessive officiousness of those who are rules-obsessed, mainly to be found farther north.

The Irish labour market illustrates the first point well. The biggest political/economic issue facing many countries today is weak job creation and, consequently, high unemployment. This is caused largely by the accumulation of excessive labour regulation that has reduced firms' ability and willingness to take on staff.

Ireland has avoided this mistake. The Irish economy has created massive employment and most agree that the balance between the rights of employers and workers is generally fair.

Northern Europeans are not without bad regulatory habits, even if theirs are less damaging than those of their counterparts closer to the Mediterranean.

With at least half of all new legislation affecting business enacted at EU level, how governments 'transpose' (in eurojargon) these laws onto national statute books is important. Overzealous bureaucrats in national capitals sometimes go beyond what was envisaged in Brussels to 'gold-plate' EU legislation, making the rules even more burdensome.

Irish civil servants have generally resisted this temptation.

But while Ireland has been cautious in heaping new rules on business, its big weakness remains its failure to clear away existing regulations that have become obviously obsolete (if they were ever a good idea in the first place).

The latest OECD report in Ireland, published last February, showed that progress in the five years since the government committed itself to a programme of deregulation has been pitifully slow.

Removing antediluvian controls in the electricity and gas markets, which would cut costs for all firms, have gone nowhere and walls of rules continue to protect a range of professional services sectors to the detriment of everyone else.

Another weakness in the Irish system, which reflects slow reaction times and not inconsiderable inertia, is how Ireland lags in adopting international best practice.

The lack of impetus to systematically screen all new legislation, with a view to cutting out elements that undermine competitiveness, is a case in point.

Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) is all the rage, and internationally, the Netherlands' is recognised as being at the cutting edge.

But despite having a good model to work towards, Ireland has moved slowly.

The government's Better Regulation Forum is peopled more by those who draw up regulations (civil servants) than by those who are on their sharp end, and only a fraction of new bills are scrutinised for their impact on businesses.

Thankfully, the negative effects of the sluggishness in putting proper RIA structures in place is lessened, to some extent at least, by a unique feature of the Irish system . . . officials' awareness of just how important foreign investment is for the country's prosperity.

The imperative of attracting and keeping foreign firms has soaked deep into every nook and cranny of the apparatus of the state in a way not to be observed elsewhere. This has made policy-makers across the system alive to the dangers of making the business environment less attractive. And just in case functionaries forget this for a moment, the IDA hovers omnipresent to let them know if what they propose might make its investmentluring job harder.

In many ways the strengths and weaknesses of the Irish approach to regulation are two sides of the same coin. Caution and conservatism prevent nuttier proposals making it into law, but they also hinder good ideas from being implemented quickly and efficiently. Given this weakness, it is all the more necessary that political leaders provide the impetus for change from the top.