Budget 2021: the reaction from West Sussex

Politicians and business leaders have weighed in on Rishi Sunak's speech

Author: Ryan BurrowsPublished 4th Mar 2021

Rishi Sunak's Budget has received a mixed reaction from business leaders and politicians in West Sussex.

The Chancellor has revealed a number of measures which are set to benefit people and businesses across the county.

Everything from the Budget which will affect you

Announcements include:

• The extension of the Furlough scheme until September

• A further extension of the Self Employed Income Support Scheme with 600,000 people who became self-employed last year

• Restart grants to help businesses reopen

• An extension of the reduced rate of 5% VAT for tourism and hospitality businesses for six months

• The 100% business rates holiday extended to June for eligible businesses

• A Super Deduction to encourage investment in businesses

• The introduction of Government-backed 95% mortgages for first time buyers

• The extension of the Stamp Duty holiday for three months

• The scrapping of planned increases in fuel and alcohol duty

What do West Sussex's MPs and council leaders think?

Gillian Keegan, MP for Chichester and Apprenticeships and Skills Minister, told Greatest Hits Radio that the Budget gives extra reassurances to those seeking to further their careers:

"These are fantastic programmes, they really do help both young people and adults who are looking for that second career, that second opportunity, a chance to retrain into something more valuable, including higher incentives, extending the programme and more traineeship places.

"It's going to be fantastic for businesses in Chichester."

Gillian also said the Budget helped the Government to meet some key aims:

"It builds on our ambitious level-up agenda with investment to all four corners of the UK, using our environmental goals to get there, so more offshore wind, new green bonds and the UK's first infrastructure bank - I think they'll also all be real signs of where our growth's going to come."

West Worthing MP and Father of the House Sir Peter Bottomley was among the first to speak about the Budget in the House of Commons following Rishi Sunak's speech.

Sir Peter said there were positives to draw, such as the decision not to increase alcohol duty, which he has said will help get local pubs back on their feet when they re-open following the coronavirus lockdown.

"Our landladies and landlords have put so much into sustaining their businesses and lost so much over the last year due to drastic and immediate lockdowns announced by the Government.

"I ask all my constituents to go out and have a drink, alcoholic or not, with their friends when they can."

However, he also mentioned there were areas 'in need of improvement' such as the lack of support for businesses without a shop front - or the lack of mention of leasehold or cladding concerns.

One leader voicing his objection to the proposals was Crawley Borough Council's Labour leader Peter Lamb.

Cllr Lamb had written an open letter to Rishi Sunak prior to Wednesday's speech, highlighting that the promised £25m of Town Deal funding would no longer be enough to significantly improve the employment crisis facing the town.

He said that the town had been passed over in favour of investing in Northern England, including a large number of seats in the so-called 'red wall' which the Conservatives won for the first time in a generation in the 2019 General Election.

Cllr Lamb said:

‘If I was a Crawley Conservative voter and I’d lost my job four months after the General Election due to the Government’s coronavirus restrictions, then I heard that my Government’s Budget not only gave all the job-creation opportunities to marginal constituencies in the North, but slashed the funding we’d already been promised before the election, I would feel utterly taken for granted.’

The reaction from West Sussex businesses

As well as politicians, those running firms across West Sussex have been weighing in on the proposals.

The decision to freeze alcohol duty was welcomed by Amar Tanna, who runs the New Moon pub in Crawley, who told Sky News:

"Every year, April is that time where we prepare for the worst, it's two years running now that we haven't.

"Anything that isn't a negative has to be a positive as far as I'm concerned."

And what about charities?

One Horsham-based charity has criticised the decision to end the £20 Universal Credit uplift in September.

Action For Children has claimed that if the six-month extension only applied to existing claimants, an estimated 390,000 new Universal Credit households with children would miss out on a combined total of £202.8 million compared to existing claimants – equal to each family losing £520 over six months.

The charity's director of policy and campaigns, Imran Hussain, said:

“It makes no sense to cut this lifeline in six months when the furlough scheme will have ended and unemployment is expected to be near its highest – exactly when families will need it most. Families need help and certainty, not a stay of execution.

“There’s no faster way to push more children into poverty than by snatching £20 a week out of the pockets of our country’s poorest families. Many of them are in work and doing their best to hold their heads above water after a traumatic year that’s seen hours cut and wage packets slashed.

“We ask the Prime Minister to urgently make the uplift permanent for all Universal Credit and Working Tax Credit claimants - and extend it to legacy benefit claimants - to prevent a generation of vulnerable children from being scarred by poverty and the pandemic."

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