British Business Bank set on delivering Labour’s growth ambition June 28, 2025 Arguably one of the biggest winners from Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ latest spending splurge, the British Business Bank had its lending capacity beefed up and pledged to back the UK’s innovators with its expanded range. The bank had its funding capacity increased to £25.6bn in the Spending Review from near £15.6bn as it targets eight key [...]
Will banks be able to escape a Reeves’ tax raid this Autumn? June 27, 2025 As Rachel Reeves watches her fiscal headroom crumble with every Labour U-turn, the Chancellor may return to her budget mantra that those with the “broadest shoulders should bear the heavier burden”. Lenders managed to skirt a tax raid in the 2024 budget after lobbyists warned it could damage the sector’s international competitiveness, but renewed fiscal [...]
Kemi Badenoch: I’ll only support welfare bill if government pledges no tax rises June 27, 2025 Kemi Badenoch has said she would only support Labour’s welfare bill if the government pledges not to raise taxes further at the next budget. More than 100 Labour MPs had threatened to vote against the bill in its original form amid concerns over a reduction in personal independence payments to their constituents. The government has [...]
Reeves may need larger fiscal buffer to ‘build credibility’ June 27, 2025 Chancellor Rachel Reeves may need to make her headroom larger than £9.9bn in the autumn to restore credibility and fund policy U-turns, an economics think tank has warned, prompting warnings that “unpopular tax hikes” are coming down the line. Proposed welfare reforms saved the government £4.8bn at the Spring Statement in a last minute rush [...]
Labour’s welfare U-turn spikes fears of tax hikes June 27, 2025 The Labour government has confirmed its latest U-turn with a significant retreat on welfare reform dealing a crushing blow to Rachel Reeves’ waning fiscal headroom. The bill initially targeted restrictions on personal independence payments (PIP) and limited the sickness-related element of universal credit in a bid to shed £5bn from the welfare budget by 2030. Under [...]
Heathrow eyes earnings crunch as national insurance hike weighs June 27, 2025 London Heathrow airport expects its earnings for 2025 to take a hit as it weighs the cost of Labour’s hike to employer’s national insurance contributions. The airport expects earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) to decrease by three per cent to near £1.98bn over the year due to higher operating costs brought on [...]
Is Labour changing its mind about the OBR? June 27, 2025 Labour is becoming increasingly disillusioned with the OBR as the reality sets in that no anount of forecasting can solve Britain’s spending problems, says Paul Ormerod How fashions change! Less than a year ago, Labour politicians were falling over themselves to praise the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR). Labour was elected on a promise of [...]
Jeremy Hunt ‘made mistake’ in taxing non doms June 27, 2025 Former Chancellor Jeremy Hunt was wrong to target non doms as part of efforts to raise more government revenue from tax, shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith has said. Hunt abolished a special tax status for non-domiciled residents in his last Budget, then raising £2.7bn, before Rachel Reeves went further by removing a carve-out that allowed [...]
City regulators must work more constructively with businesses, experts say June 26, 2025 City regulators have been urged to work more constructively with businesses to ease compliance costs, experts have said amid plans for major regulatory reform by the government. Regulators such as the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Prudential Regulatory Authority (PRA) were frequently too slow to respond to messages from businesses and were often deliberately [...]
City minister opens door to weakening banks ombudsman June 26, 2025 City minister Emma Reynolds has suggested the government could remove powers from the banks ombudsman as part of efforts to ease regulatory burdens faces by financial services. Reynolds told an audience of bankers and investors that the end of a review on the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS), which acts to settle complaints made by consumers [...]