The IoD is urging the Chancellor to put entrepreneurs at the heart of the recovery, and avoid damaging tax hikes, in its Budget submission which has just been published.
As well as calling for an extension of measures to deal with the ongoing economic impact of Covid-19, the Institute called for a stimulus package to unleash investment in start-ups and scale-ups through targeted reliefs. The submission calls on the Government to provide a grant package to the millions of owner-directors who have been without significant financial support for almost a year. Alongside a temporary relief for employers’ National Insurance Contributions, as an option to ease business costs, the IoD called on the Treasury to help entrepreneurs drive the recovery by not raising Corporation and Capital Gains taxes, as some reports suggest.
To help businesses and the economy to adjust to the post-Brexit landscape, the Institute pressed the Government to issue Brexit adjustment vouchers for SMEs and significantly increase DIT’s resource to help businesses make the most of trade agreements, alongside reversing the decision to scrap duty-free shopping for visitors to the UK. The IoD has also urged the Government to put ‘levelling up’ into action, by accelerating the roll-out of faster broadband, investing in R&D, and incentivising retraining.
