Andrew Griffith

Either the Government do not know but should know, or they do know and should say. The Budget also included the highest-ever increase in capital gains tax, and a reduction in business property relief. Just as with the family farm tax, that reduction is an attack on the family-owned businesses that dominate our high streets and industrial parks. The incentive to take risk, and to create and grow a family business with the objective of passing it on, will be fundamentally undermined. Some 75% of UK businesses are family run, and in aggregate they employ 50% of all workers in the economy. We are talking about decades of hard work, dedicated to building a legacy, and people creating an insurance policy for their passing. The so-called “loopholes” in inheritance tax that Government Front-Benchers talk about are legitimate tax policies, introduced by a Labour Government in 1976 to ensure that businesses were not broken up and devastated on the death of an owner, to the detriment of the remaining employees, workers, suppliers, customers, the wider economy, and even the Treasury, which would lose future tax take. This measure could be devastating for our communities and our high streets up and down the country. It is not just Conservative Members who are sounding the alarm, though we may be doing it with a greater degree of passion. The chief executive officer of UKHospitality said that the increase in national insurance will undermine businesses operating at the margins and “be a brake on growth”. Family Business UK, which represents family-owned enterprises, has said that the Budget “removes entirely any incentive for starting or running a family business.”