Rain Newton-Smith address to CBI Annual Conference 2025

Intro and thanks:  

Thank you Tracy and good morning everyone!

Welcome to our Annual Conference.

This marks 60 years since the CBI was founded to be – the voice of UK business

Through 14 Prime Ministers, 20 Chancellors, and over 100 Budgets…

…we’ve been here – fighting for you and for a better economy.

Because we believe in you – our business leaders.

Because we know business isn’t just an entry at Companies House.

Nor is it just a resource to be taxed when the going gets tough.

You are the ones creating jobs, building opportunity, lifting living standards.

Finding solutions, driving real change in our communities. I’ve seen it first-hand.

Through good times and bad, rain or shine, you literally keep the lights on in this country.

Beacons against the narrative – of broken Britain.

That’s what the CBI is here for. To back you.

The road to growth: 

Today I want to make one simple case.

Right now, we have a government who say they want growth.

Well business wants growth too.

And the truth is – only business can deliver it.

But to do that, we need one thing from this government – and we need it now… 
…stability.

Stability that gives you the confidence to invest, to expand, to lead.

If growth is our destination…

…stability is the only road to get there.

There’s no shortcut. No bypass.

Stability is the road to growth.

Credit where it’s due: 

I genuinely believe this government wants growth…

…it wants to get down that road. And business wants them to succeed.

In their first year and a half they tackled some of the biggest obstacles to raising living standards in our country…

…deep problems in our economy left untouched for too long.

Transforming our broken planning system…

…where to build anything new, you wade through more pages than the complete works of Shakespeare.

If only brevity were the soul of wit in government.

They’ve just announced hundreds more planners to get Britain building…

…a key CBI Budget ask.

They’ve pledged to take a strimmer to red tape.

They have set and kept a corporate tax roadmap for global competitiveness.

They’ve protected an extra £100bn in capital spending this parliament – vital for our long-term growth.

That is brave and bold

In months, this government has launched the most ambitious Industrial Strategy in years…

…shaped through hundreds of meetings with the CBI, with many of you in this room.

We’ve seen the first Trade Strategy since Brexit.

The first serious Infrastructure Strategy in over a decade.

These are clear, ambitious plans.

But here’s the thing – so far, so many of them are just that… plans.

Strategies may point the way – but they don’t pour the concrete.

A fork in the road: 

Stability is the only road to growth.

But at this moment, ahead of the Budget on Wednesday…

…it feels, for too many of you, like we are off-track.

Because here we are again.

A year on from a Budget that turned to business to plug a hole…

…loading on £24 billion per year in extra costs.

Pushing the tax burden to a 25-year high…

…with two-thirds of those taxes hitting business before you’ve even made a profit.

Changing Inheritance Tax rules for farmers and family firms alike – draining investment, squeezing margins and putting over 200,000 jobs at risk.

One year later, here we are again…

A new fiscal gap. Billions of pounds wide.

More rumours. More U-turns. Raising uncertainty

Business holding its breath again. Investment paused, projects on hold.

It feels less like we’re on the move…

…and more like we’re stuck in Groundhog Day.

So right now, we face a fork in the road.

Where our biggest fear is, if we get the wrong choices on Wednesday…

More short-term tinkering…

More bold choices not made…

More politics over growth…

…then we risk getting locked in a stop-start economy.

Where large tax rises rear their head every year or even every Autumn and Spring.

That is not the road to growth.

That is a cycle of doubt and uncertainty.

A road – to decline.

The road to renewal: 

Well I don’t accept that.

I don’t think anyone in this room does.

This is the country that forged the Industrial Revolution, that built the NHS, that leads the world in science, media and culture.

It’s the country I was born in – and after growing up in Canada, as an immigrant, the one I chose again, with pride, to raise my children in.

It is a country with deep roots of greatness represented here today:

Leaders of our world-class financial services.

Builders of everything from offshore wind platforms to digital solutions for small business.

Trailblazers in health, science and media

Universities and colleges that prepare our young people and shape the future.

I have the great privilege of seeing the work you do day in, day out.

This is a country with boundless potential.

And I did not come into this job to manage decline. And I know you don’t come to work each day to watch opportunity slip through your fingers.

So let’s talk honestly about what it takes to stay on that road to growth.

Choose growth: 

We have been clear with this government.

There is no easy way to the growth we need. But there is a right one.

It means having one goal and at every turn, choosing it.

So if growth is your priority, prove it – make hard choices for it.

Against opposition, against short-term politics.

Be it welfare, be it pensions increases – show the markets you mean business.

All short-term politics leads to is long-term decline…

…and this country cannot afford another decade of stagnation.

That means making hard choices for growth now – before they get harder.

Having the courage to take two tough decisions rather than twenty easier ones.

Raising the headroom to make promises stick.

It means one or two broad tax rises, rather than death by a thousand taxes.

Twenty bad choices don’t make for a good system.

It means stop being defined by the past – own the challenges of today.

Lead forward with hope and confidence. Talk up our capabilities. Our universities, our brilliant business leaders in this room.

Above all, it means recognising this Budget is about credibility. About trust.

You will never be able to tax your way to growth.

Tax rises alone are bound to fail…

…unless they are matched by forward momentum.

Radical, deep change to reignite confidence and get investment flowing.

Growth, not taxes, is the only way out of decline.

And that starts with business – with all of you in this room.

Stability is the road to growth.

Brakes on growth: 

But right now, there are too many roadblocks.

Not just the uncertainty of the Budget…

…but across our economy

Business wants to invest, to transform the fortunes of this country.

But when we need a green light to go…

…there are too many red lights flashing across the dashboard.

Mixed signals. Promises not yet delivered.

That’s what we are hearing from you every day.

How can you compete, how can you invest…

…when you are straining under some of the highest electricity costs in the world?

Targeted support helps – but this issue touches every business.

How can you grow your business on the ground…

…when the rates system actively holds you back?

How can business hire for growth…

…build on the Mayfield review, help three million people with long-term health conditions back into work…

…when some key government choices pull the other way?

When NICs rises and likely changes to salary sacrifice make it more costly to take a chance on people?

When we have an Employment Rights Bill that eight in ten firms say, in its current form…

…makes it harder to say:…

…“Yes – I can find a job for you.”

These are not academic issues.

They are brakes on growth.

With real consequences for real people.

Fix what’s broken: 

So our message is simple: if this government truly wants the road to growth…

…work with business to fix what’s broken – at this Budget and beyond.

Pick up the policies that have sat in the “too difficult” box for too long.

Forge a tax system that rewards investment.

A rates system that encourages growth.

Get the infrastructure we need.

Get the economy moving.

Go big. Go bold.

Deliver, deliver, deliver on the promises you’ve made.

Business can help – with real partnership between public and private.

Since 2018, when we stopped PPP, our competitors have delivered over a thousand partnerships – building hospitals, schools, and smart cities around the world.

Opportunities we missed. Growth that just slid past.

Don’t let it happen again. Work with us.

On energy costs – business backs the energy transition, the only long-term path to sustainable growth.

And we know that takes new infrastructure.

But how we pay for it must reflect the value it delivers over time.

Instead of short-term patches, we need a long-term, affordable solution…

…that recognises the role of the North Sea in our transition…

…that fixes the structure of energy bills – the system and policy charges that push UK electricity costs above our competitors.

Work with us to make it happen.

And finally – change course on the Employment Rights Bill.

Lasting reform takes partnership – not a closed door.

The minimum wage, the last Labour Government’s defining reform, has endured for almost 30 years because it was built together…

…business, government and unions side by side. Shoulder to shoulder.

That’s true social partnership: rising living standards, real progress, lasting change.

But with this Bill, though government said it wanted to listen…

…there has been no meaningful change.

It’s disappointing, and it’s damaging.

We want reform that works – and endures. That lasts for generations

For that, government must change course – ask business and unions to forge consensus through compromise.

It’s a model that delivered before – and it can deliver again, for working people and for growth.

Where we’re going: 

And remember: tough choices only matter if they move us forward.

When you take people down a hard road, you must show them where it leads.

Not just management, but leadership and vision.

Because confidence comes from stability – but also from hope.

The courage to imagine the destination.

A UK growing with confidence again – led by business.

Where planning decisions take weeks, not years.

Where business give young people their start, and older workers their next chapter.

Where firms choose to invest, manufacture and list here.

Where we stand up for free and fair trade, attracting investment and talent from round the world.

Where we don’t just promise critical infrastructure: we build it – better trains, better hospitals, homes and communities.

Where families live longer, healthier, happier lives – in a country not falling behind, but leading once more.

That is the road to growth.

Conclusion: 

Yes, the road ahead is hard.

But we have walked harder roads before.

Yes, the way ahead is long.

But we are determined. We are resolute.

Business wants to get there.

But that ambition must be met with action.

From a government that chooses stability. That chooses renewal. That chooses growth at every turn.

Let’s make this the moment we stop stalling.

Let’s make this the moment we shift gear.

Let’s make this a country not stuck – but surging ahead on the road to growth.

Not broken Britain – but a country moving forward to a better future.

Thank you.