‘Tough Budget for business,’ say representative groups

Business representative groups in Northern Ireland have expressed concern at a “tough Budget”.

They say increases to the employer cost base will increase the burden on businesses.

Angela McGowan, director, CBI Northern Ireland, described a tough Budget for business.

“While the Corporation Tax Roadmap will help create much needed stability, Northern Ireland companies still have to compete with a rate of just 15% a few miles down the road in the Republic of Ireland,” she said.

“The hike in National Insurance Contributions alongside other increases to the employer cost base will increase the burden on business and hit the ability to invest and ultimately make it more expensive to hire people or give pay rises.”

Alan Lowry, policy chairman of the Federation of Small Businesses in Northern Ireland said most of the tax increases will fall on businesses.

“Against these new taxes, the true test of today’s Budget will be whether small businesses can grow and end the economic stagnation in which the UK has been stuck,” he said.

“Many SMEs will struggle with the rises in employer national insurance on top of the substantial increases in the National Minimum Wage and the large cost implications from proposed employment law reforms.

“Against a challenging backdrop, today’s Budget will take time to digest but it seems to show a direction in business policy for the whole of this Parliament where support will be aimed at smaller businesses rather than big corporates, but where the significant amount of revenue that the Government wants to raise will come directly from business.”

Suzanne Wylie, chief executive, Northern Ireland Chamber of Commerce and Industry also expressed concern.

“While businesses acknowledge the need to stabilise public finances and support investment in public services, the alarming acceleration of the tax burden on businesses is deeply concerning,” she said.

“In the absence of material growth, this will add to already high business costs and is likely to impact confidence and investment intentions.

“For businesses in Northern Ireland, there are further unknowns.

“While the additional £1.5 billion in funding for the region is welcome, we need the NI Executive to move promptly to publish its draft budget so that we can start delivering greater certainty for people and businesses here too.

“The Chancellor announced a wide range of initiatives designed to incentivise economic growth across the UK in high growth sectors like defence, aerospace, life sciences and clean energy.

“We must ensure that Northern Ireland gets its fair share of this.”

Joel Neill, operations director of Hospitality Ulster, said the Budget has done nothing but increase the cost of doing business.

“While our hospitality colleagues in England and Wales are rightly upset at the lowering of the 75% business rates relief to the 40% announced in today’s Budget, hospitality businesses in Northern Ireland were never party to this relief,” he said.

“Paired with the Budget’s increase of the National Minimum and Living Wage, increase in employers’ National Insurance contributions and decrease in the threshold for those contributions, today’s Budget will have done nothing but increase the cost of doing business for hospitality.

“We all want to see people paid more.

“Our members want to reward good work and make work pay but what is being asked of businesses is simply unsustainable if taxes are going to shoot up at the same time.

“Without the extension of rates relief to Northern Ireland’s hospitality businesses or a decrease to VAT, these measures will only threaten employment and businesses in the sector.”