At the beginning of the ‘recession’ I was interviewed by BBC Radio 4’s ‘The World This Weekend’ about what we wanted the Chancellor to do in his first recession budget. I said nothing.
I don’t mean that I didn’t say anything, I mean that I said could he please leave us alone. Instead they increased NI to a laughable amount which penalises anyone like us who wants to hire people and put up taxes for high earners (great, thanks for that).
Before the last election, I asked my local MP (Jonathan Djanogly, Conservative) what they will be doing for business if we all vote for them.
Answer? Reducing red tape for start ups, helping people in Social Housing start businesses and stopping the government foreclosing businesses because they owe small amounts of back tax.
All of which is good no doubt, but none of which helps our business as it’s been going 10 years, we work in an office and (sadly) our tax bill is rather higher than 48p.
So what I want is this:
1. The cost of employing people to go down. NI is a shocker and I’d rather it went in the pockets of our employees.
2. The ability to move around the UK easily (particularly on public transport).
3. Uniformly high quality skills from graduates. Am fed up with interviewing so called graduates who can’t spell.
4. An improved technology infrastructure. Annoying still to be in some areas of the UK and not be able to get a mobile signal.
5. A more level playing field for public sector contracts involving far less timewasting on the PQQ level.
Be interested to hear what other people in the business really really want.
