Red tape means bureaucracy - pointless and annoying process and paperwork. Ethical red tape is bureaucracy that has been added for reasons of ethics - this is typical of financial services and medicine, for example.

Red tape is an excessive bureaucracy or adherence to rules and formalities, especially in public business. "this law will just create more red tape" 'ethical' works as an adjective of the noun "red tape". example: when a doctor tries to save the life of a murderer who have killed a lot of people and shot itself, it's because the doctor's ethical red tape. 希望我帮助过你 or Mam nadzieję, że ci pomogłem.

red line border for the ethical matter

Thank you mike, it seems there are many Muslims in the UK.

red tape is an idiom meaning excessive regulations. so we if we hide behind red tape, we do nothing because we put excessive regulations on something which makes it impossible to actually do it. hiding behind Ethical red tape means we do or can do nothing because of the complex ethical situation. So we might like to help Muslims at a time of famine but because the food we have is not halal we do nothing because ideally food for Muslins must be halal (permitted) food.