On Wednesday 11 September we attended The House of Lords for the launch of the United Growth Briefing Paper prepared by The Entrepreneurs Network and supported by Sumer.
The paper highlights to the policy makers the 5 key areas that are important to SMEs to allow them to grow and therefore help our economy grow.
SMEs are the bedrock of our economy and we were honoured to attend and support this initiative on behalf of the SMEs of Staffordshire and Cheshire.
The United Growth briefing paper
This represents our first major piece of external thought leadership and speaks directly to our mission as a business champion. The content of the briefing paper is based on survey results of over 620 SME owners right across the UK and Ireland and we’ve worked with The Entrepreneurs Network to develop this into five core policy recommendations, which are:
- Ensure business taxes are competitive – by not raising the headline rate of Corporation Tax any further, and ensuring reform of Capital Gains Tax does not discourage entrepreneurial activity;
- Invest in infrastructure to keep Britain moving – by streamlining the planning process, allowing developers to capture more of the value uplift they create and exploring alternative financing methods to construction;
- Increase the supply of premises to give businesses more space to grow – by liberalising regulations that prevent development and reforming Business Rates to be fairer to businesses of different sizes and to incentivise more productive land use;
- Unleash the next phase of mayoral devolution – by granting ‘London-style’ powers to all metro mayors and examining what fiscal powers could be devolved from Whitehall;
- Make Britain open for business to more of the world – by restarting negotiations on a free trade agreement with the US and offering a Youth Mobility Scheme to the EU and US.
What are we doing with this?
Our clients sit across all sectors and regions of the UK & Ireland. This affords us a privileged position to understand what SME businesses need to thrive. The launch event is our first opportunity to communicate with policy makers, the SME community and wider market and to share our findings.
