I think that things are changing for the better. The CAA can see that EASA is going to push out a lot of their functions so they need to be more customer-friendly.
In 2002, when my TB20 was new, the initial CofA inspector demanded that the IFR GPS (which was IFR BRNAV certified by Socata) is disabled for IFR and only VFR features are enabled. Of course I got that changed back (privately) afterwards, as the IFR function was on the CAA approved type certificate!! He then stuck EXIT stickers on the doors (yeah, the doors on a TB20 are really hard to find), and stuck an INOP sticker on the prop TKS on/off switch because he didn't think a prop-only TKS is "official". That sticker was obviously removed the moment he left. So.... a complete waste of space really.
I don't think they do that sort of thing today.
But their past attitude to e.g. IFR GPS has created a huge legacy of noncompliant installations which cannot be approach approved because they were put in for VFR only (because "everybody" thought that GPS is illegal, or illegal for IFR, etc) and don't have the proper indicators in the right place.