UK Government urged to help amid warning manufacturing sector has ‘hit the buffers’
The UK Government is being urged to help manufacturers after a new report warned the sector has “hit the buffers”.
Make UK and business advisers BDO said their research among more than 300 manufacturers suggested that increasing employment taxes and wider business costs were affecting companies, as well as worries of a global trade war.
Firms are freezing recruitment and considering redundancies, while investment plans are being delayed and in some cases cancelled altogether, said the report.
Make UK called on the Government to reform business rates, fix the “broken” skills system and launch a long-term industrial strategy which has advanced manufacturing at its heart.
Barriers
Verity Davidge, policy director at Make UK, said: “Manufacturers feel like they are currently wading through treacle, facing barriers and increased costs being imposed on them at every turn.
“The one light at the end of the tunnel is the prospect of a modern, long-term industrial strategy which will enable them to plan for the future with confidence in a supportive policy environment.
“This cannot be a case of more jam tomorrow, come the summer it has to be a case of jam today.”
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Net Zero and its associated eye-watering energy prices has effectively been de-industrialising the UK for over a decade. Rachel Reeves’s disastrous budget is about to tax jobs out of existence. Who knew this would be the outcome? Well, pretty much anyone with a passing interest – except for Reeves & Miliband of course.
Free trade deals with parts of the world who can make it cheaper because they don’t mind sending their kids down pits has been finishing what Thatcher started. But I’m guessing you voted for all that globalisation.