The chancellor has delivered his most small business friendly Budget to date. The Budget has bought in good news for the anxious small businesses. There is always a nervous environment pre-Budget, and small business owners can now breathe a sigh of relief. From the VAT threshold being kept at £85,000 to the fuel duty to be frozen for the ninth year running, the chancellor has been praised by the small business community.
The Budget has announced that the chancellor will support the high street, which is the home of many small businesses. There will be a £900million of business rates support for the small businesses on the high street. Another win for the small business community was the employment allowance staying put, allowing small business employers to save £3,000 on their National Insurance Contribution bills.
Dr Amir Qamar, lecturer in Strategic Management at the Birmingham Business School said: “£900m in business relief for small business will certainly help to keep operations afloat in the short-term. However, £675m to rejuvenate high streets will not help unless some firms understand that their current business model requires radical transformation and modernisation. Consumer behaviour and spending patterns have changed, perhaps we should let the market dictate the future of firms that are reluctant to change.”
The continuous changing of consumer behaviour will need small businesses to step in and take action, as the business relief for small businesses alone will not be enough to keep the high street alive.
Mike Cherry, the Chairman of the FSB commented: “This is the most small-business-friendly Budget that this Chancellor has delivered. He has listened to our requests across many areas of tax and public policy, putting him firmly on the side of Britain’s small businesses.
“On the tax front, small firms up and down the country will be pleased to see the VAT threshold frozen for two years. FSB was credited in the speech for our campaign on this, stopping an over-reach which would have created a mountain of bureaucracy and a tax hike for more than a million businesses. I look forward to seeing further innovative changes to VAT post-Brexit.
“Small businesses on our high streets that cannot get Small Business Rate Relief will be delighted with the significant discount for the next 2 years, which on average will help these businesses to the tune of almost £2,000 each, but potentially up to around £16,000 off small businesses facing the biggest bills.”
Some other great news for the small business community includes; the start-up loans scheme been extended to 2021, and the fuel duty been frozen for the ninth year running, which can have a huge impact on small businesses costs.
More on small business news. More detailed summary and analysis of Budget 2018 is available here.
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