CBI demands action from Osborne
Budget hopes ahoy
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Business lobby group the CBI warned Chancellor George Osborne that the Budget must focus on helping UK companies grow by improving access to finance, cutting energy costs and increasing exports.
The CBI said the Chancellor should redouble efforts to increase exports. It welcomed recent moves to make export credit insurance more available to smaller firms.
It wants action to improve access to finance for small and medium enterprises. One way to do this would be to make the bond market more accessible to smaller firms by reducing corporate finance and placing fees.
The government could take on some of the risk of such bonds in order to make them more attractive to investors or offer tax incentives to anyone buying bonds from smaller companies.
It also said the Carbon Reduction Commitment should have incentives restored, or else the scheme should be scrapped.
The group called for action on fuel prices - an area in which Osborne has already hinted he may show mercy.
The CBI also wants changes to the Bribery Act which it fears could trap "legitimate business promotional expenditure". It wants evidence of corrupt intent including in the law.
It also wants to restore the two-year wait before staff can take action for unfair dismissal and reform employment tribunals. The CBI also wants to end the 50p tax rate and stop the extension of Air Passenger Duty.
The CBI's open letter to George Osborne is here.
The Budget will be presented to the House of Commons on 23 March. ®
COMMENTS
*sigh*
So basically the CBI wants the government to weaken employee rights and get rid of some green legislation to cut energy costs?
Hardly good for the people and the planet is it.
Typical
Usually I always have time for what the CBI have to say but this just reeks, fewer rights for the victims of unfair dismissal, no air tax for the people who both use it the most and need it the least (can you say video conferencing?) and lossening of corruption and environmental laws, well sorry but if businesses can't play by the rules then they shouldn't be in the game to begin with.
Their efforts to bend the rules to make the system more profitable rather than encouraging business to innovate, adapt and otherwise keep up smacks of what's happened in the finance sector allowing these kind of economic crises to happen in the first place
FFS
Why don't they lobby for less of the red-tape madness that is hamstringing UK businesses - especially the small ones that are the bedrock of UK business?
That and the "if you save money for a rainy day or to expand in the future, we'll tax the buggery hell out of it. Go get a loan from a bank instead"
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