Business leader Digby Jones has slammed the European Commission (EC) after it proposed new regulations for companies.

The latest proposal to incur Jones’s wrath was an attempt to impose German-style consultation laws on cross-border mergers.

Jones, director-general of the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), said the directive would require a firm to adopt the most restrictive consultation practices in the two merging organisations.

At the CBI’s national conference last week, he claimed this could put employee representatives on UK company boards, giving them a veto over management decisions.

He added: “Business will engage constructively with Europe, but being pro-European does not mean accepting every damaging idea that emerges from Brussels.”