Business and the Economy

Gavin Williamson Excerpts

Wednesday 21st May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Gareth Thomas]

One way that the hon. Gentleman could help businesses in Scotland would be to call for the Scottish Government to do what we are doing in this country and extend business rates relief to hospitality and leisure.

Investors from across the globe are choosing to put their money in the UK. Our international investment summit last year saw £63 billion committed to the UK—double the amount secured by the previous Government, when the Leader of the Opposition was the Secretary of State for Business and Trade—which is set to generate 38,000 new jobs. Crucially, the leaders of companies that committed to invest in our country at our international investment summit have hailed our pro-business approach as a driving factor behind their decision.

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

I am sure Members across the House agree on the need and desire to promote growth and business investment. However, small and mid-sized businesses in my constituency—especially those in the hospitality sector—have been particularly squeezed, not just through the change of rate of national insurance, but with the threshold lowering, as they employ a lot of younger people on sometimes part-time wages. Will he make representations to the Treasury for those hospitality businesses to be included in future fiscal considerations?

[Gareth Thomas]

I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that we are always talking to businesses in the hospitality sector and across the economy. I say gently to him, though, that we had to take those difficult decisions in the Budget because of the mess that we inherited from his party. Businesses in the hospitality sector and beyond need to ensure that our schools, hospitals and police are properly funded.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

rose—

[Gareth Thomas]

I am happy to give way to the right hon. Gentleman one more time.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

Could the Minister set out to the House how much his Government actually raised through additional taxes in the Budget, and how much the Government set out in terms of additional spending?

[Gareth Thomas]

Those assessments were published in the Red Book at the time of the Budget. The right hon. Gentleman can do his own research and look those figures up.

Turning back to the international investment coming into our country and the support from business leaders for our measures, Iberdrola’s executive chairman said at the time of our international investment summit that

“the clear policy direction, stable regulatory frameworks and overall attractiveness of the UK”

have led the company to double its investments over the next few years, reaching up to £24 billion. We have seen more ringing endorsements of this Government’s approach since the summit. In April, the CEO of BlackRock, Larry Fink, praised our pro-growth agenda and said that investment in Britain is “undervalued”. He said that he has more confidence in the UK economy than he did a year ago. Meanwhile, the chief executive of JP Morgan, Jamie Dimon, has told the Financial Times that he backs this Government’s economic reforms, noting that there is much to like about the new Government’s pro-growth agenda. Our forthcoming industrial and trade strategies are further steps to support businesses and accelerate growth in the sectors of our economy with the most potential.

There has not been a strategy to help small businesses for more than a decade. The Conservatives cut support to small businesses to get into new markets. They cut support to help businesses to adopt new technologies and they failed to tackle the scandal of late payments from big businesses.