EEF urges budget to emphasise growth agenda

MANUFACTURERS’ organisation EEF has called on the Government to use the Budget to deliver on its promise to set out a growth agenda for business.  

It has urged Chancellor George Osborne to signal a strategy to address barriers to growth and announce a ‘Parliament-long’ programme to deliver it.
 
EEF called for a Government ‘growth mandate’ to match its fiscal mandate  to giving business the confidence to grow, invest and create jobs in the UK.  
 
EEF Midlands head of external affairs, Sue Kirby, said: “On its own, however, this will not be enough to boost investment and growth in the short term.  Government must show it is serious about promoting growth by matching this transparency with specific measures in four key areas: tax, regulation, access to finance and skills.
 
 “The fiscal mandate has reassured business about the stability of the public finances. government must now send the same signal that it is serious about enhancing the competitiveness of our business environment by matching this with a robust growth mandate.
 
“This should demonstrate that all parts of government are working together to deliver the kind of growth our economy needs and, that it will focus on this task relentlessly over this Parliament.”    
 
The EEF wants Government to measure:  

• The change in total tax costs faced by businesses;
• Estimates of the net change in bank and non-bank external finance to non-financial companies;
• The change in total climate and environment policy costs faced by businesses;
• All new and withdrawn regulations, and the change in the total cost of all regulation;
• The change in the proportion of companies facing skills shortage and hard-to-fill vacancies.
• The change in apprenticeship starts at each level.