Weekly Brief Budget Special

Week 16 of 2009      Friday 24 April 2009

The Chancellor Alistair Darling's much anticipated Budget on Wednesday largely ignored the small businesses that are at the heart of job creation and economic recovery. The FSB responded to the mixed red box of announcements throughout the week.

Thanks Darling!

FSB National Chairman John Wright set up camp outside the Millbank television studios on Budget day where he highlighted elements of the FSB Budget submission on BBC News, Bloomberg and CNBC ahead of the announcement. As the Chancellor finished his 51 minute speech, the FSB cautiously welcomed proposals on job creation, the introduction of a trade credit insurance scheme and the extension of a scheme to help small firms reclaim tax on profits over the last three years – but our press release warned that far more could have been done.

No Darling!

As Budgets go, the FSB said this year's red box was rather light on small business support and largely ignored the needs of small firms. FSB proposals for a corporate mediator between banks and small businesses, calls for automatic rate relief and action against late payment were all missing while more costs were introduced with an increase in fuel duty and statutory redundancy pay. FSB National Chairman John Wright's concerns were reported by all the major newspapers including the Financial Times, the Times, the Daily Mail, the Daily Telegraph, the Guardian, the Independent, and the Metro. The FSB also appeared on Small Biz Pod and the BBC following the Chancellor's announcements.

Listen Darling!

The FSB will continue to campaign for many aspects of the 2009 Budget submission particularly for the introduction of automatic rate relief and a corporate mediator to help kick-start lending between banks and small businesses.

Have a good weekend,  

Marc Shoffman