CBI budget submission… for a cancelled budget

The usual fiscal events cycle has been disrupted this year, and the Autumn Budget is no exception. The new Chancellor finally confirmed the budget date for 6 November, only for it to be cancelled last week when it became clear that the UK was heading to a general election. The question of when the Budget will take place is now up in the air again. We know the Chancellor needs to deliver one Budget to the House of Commons per financial year, so the new administration may just decide to combine the Budget with the Spending Review, which is set to take place in spring 2020.

What the CBI called for

But the CBI did submit recommendations to HM Treasury in early October, which means we are ready to go as soon as a new Budget is announced. So what did we include?

From extensive member consultations over the past few months, three overarching objectives emerged:

• Protecting UK competitiveness
• Accelerating the vision for the UK
• Raising living standards across the UK by giving business breathing space from the rising cost of tax and regulation.

Each objective includes a package of recommendations, which range from reform to the UK’s broken business rates system and committing to deliver strategic infrastructure such as HS2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail, to delaying IR35 until April 2021 to allow businesses adequate time to prepare for such significant reform. The submission also set out a set of recommendations for low carbon policies in power, heat, transport and industry.

You can download the full copy of our recommendations below.

What next?

The next budget date is unknown and will largely depend on the outcome of the general election and the make-up of the new Parliament.

But that does not mean our work stops. The CBI will continue to work on creating a better environment for business to operate in. Ahead of the announcement of when the next fiscal event will be, please continue to feed in your thoughts and comments.