London businesses and charities call on Rishi Sunak to provide long-term TfL funding December 5, 2021 More than 80 London business, universities and charities have written to Rishi Sunak to call on the chancellor to provide a long-term funding deal for Transport for London (TfL). Signatories to the letter – including the chiefs of Eurostar International, the ExCel Centre and London City Airport – called on Sunak to provide a funding [...]
Sunak gears up to slash taxes December 4, 2021 Rishi Sunak is preparing to cut income tax by 2p in the pound or to slash VAT rates before the next election.
Liberal Democrats call for £5.5bn-a-year tax cuts for small businesses December 2, 2021 The Liberal Democrats are calling for Rishi Sunak to bring in a package of tax cuts for small businesses that would be worth up to £5.5bn-a-year. Party leader Ed Davey said “Boris Johnson must be living on another planet” if he thinks his government’s planned tax rises, which will increase the country’s tax burden to [...]
US platform buys Seedrs for $100m after CMA blocks Crowdcube merger on home turf December 1, 2021 UK crowdfunding platform Seedrs is being acquired by US investment platform Republic, just months after the UK’s competition watchdog blocked its plans to merge with homegrown rival Crowdcube. In a transatlantic deal that values Seedrs at approximately $100m (£75m), the two platforms are billing the combined entity as “the first global private investment marketplace with [...]
Boris and the blue wall: Can the PM hold the Tories’ new electoral coalition together? November 29, 2021 The story of Boris Johnson’s 2019 General Election landslide was the political realignment that saw swathes of traditional Labour areas turn blue across the North and the Midlands. However, Johnson’s electoral offering and tilt toward the so-called Red Wall may have had unintended consequences on the UK’s political geography. The Conservatives under Boris Johnson are [...]
Mel Stride MP urges chancellor to slash taxes to ease cost of living crisis November 29, 2021 The chairman of an influential group of MPs that scrutinises the spending plans of the government has told Tory chancellor Rishi Sunak to slash taxes to ease the cost of living crisis looming over Brits. Speaking to the PA news agency, Conservative MP Mel Stride, who chairs the Treasury Committee, called on the chancellor to [...]
Tory by-election candidate says levelling up agenda includes outer London November 28, 2021 The Conservative candidate in an upcoming by-election has claimed the government’s levelling up agenda includes poorer parts of outer London. Old Bexley and Sidcup candidate Louie French told City A.M. that Boris Johnson’s flagship agenda, generally thought to only encompass the Midlands and the North, “completely” includes economically deprived areas of the capital and that [...]
Rebel Tory MP Steve Baker to set up new campaign to push low-tax agenda November 28, 2021 Perennial rebel Tory MP Steve Baker is setting up a new Westminster campaign group to push Boris Johnson to adopt a low tax, small state position in the wake of a series of tax rises. Baker, who has a history of running successful parliamentary rebellions against Tory Prime Ministers, is planning to run a campaign [...]
The public and private divide has shifted and Thatcherism won’t save us November 26, 2021 This, said Margaret Thatcher as she drew Friedrich Hayek’s The Constitution of Liberty from her bag and slammed it on the table, is what we believe. The “vegetables”, as Spitting Image so memorably characterised her cabinet, agreed. Thatcher knew what she believed and the business community knew it too. It was the clarity of her [...]
Lidl aims for 1,100 UK stores by 2025, creating 4,000 new jobs November 24, 2021 Supermarket Lidl has announced plans to have 1,100 stores across the UK by 2025, creating 4,000 new jobs, after opening 55 stores during the first year of the pandemic. It comes as the grocer published its accounts filed with Companies House for the 12 months to the end of February showing revenues jumped 12 per [...]