What British law allows specialty British sports car manufacturers to forgo emissions and safety laws?

I understood British automotive laws as having exemptions for specialty automotive manufacturers whereby they were not required to meet emissions or safety standards (presumably because designing and testing for such standards is too costly for small car manufacturers), thus resulting in a large flourishing of specialty sports car manufacturers in the UK.





Can anyone verify this?|||I live in the UK and I am unaware of any laws that allow companies to bypass safety and emission rules.





Safety targets and emissions are normally set by the European Union so the UK cannot exempt companies.





I am almost 100% sure that this is not true because the larger car companies would be up in arms as to what would constitute a small car firm.





Not only that, but if they allowed car manufacturers to bypass safety laws, then the cars would be unsafe. I know for a fact that all cars in the UK have to go through testing before they are allowed out on the road. That is regardless of whether they are made by a manufacturer or by some guy in his shed.