Yesterday, Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander told BBC1’s The Politics Show that although it was “a complicated idea” and “difficult to see precisely how we achieve it” it was something the government was looking at carefully, echoing comments made by Prime Minister David Cameron last week.
At the same time, Mr Alexander said the coalition was examining the possibility of offering a discount on fuel to people living in remote areas of the UK, including the Scottish Highlands, the Western Isles, west Wales and parts of England and Northern Ireland.
Petrol retailers in those areas are likely to be hoping that if the move goes ahead, it happens sooner rather than later.
According to a report in yesterday’s Mail on Sunday, Brian Madderson, chairman of the Retail Motor Industry Federation’s petrol division, says that rural petrol stations will soon be a thing of the past, thanks to soaring fuel prices that are encouraging a trend of motorists preferring to drive up to 30 miles to use cheaper supermarket filling stations or large petrol retailers in urban areas.
He says: “I fear the whole refuelling network in this country is now under threat. By the end of the decade, there will be no retail petrol stations in country areas.”
And he predicts that 500 petrol retailers, the majority in rural areas, will go out of business in the next 12 months, resulting in the loss of around 5,000 jobs.
That’s a grim prospect indeed. Anyone who has ever lived in a rural area will know that a car is a virtual necessity, due to the inadequacies of public transport links, and the disappearance of local petrol stations will do nothing to make life easier.
High fuel prices are affecting us all, in one way or another. Helping people out in rural communities, with the particular challenges they face, is probably a good place to start for the coalition. But the whole country is also looking for some support to ease their pain.
For more information, please visit www.glazers.co.uk
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( 3 / 814 )When former Chancellor Alistair Darling proposed a £30,000 levy on so-called ‘non doms’ – those resident in the UK but not paying tax on their overseas income – it seemed to fit in with the mood of the times, as the recession fed demands for everyone to pay their fair share.
Indeed, the then Conservative opposition could hardly argue with the plan, since they had proposed something similar to finance their proposals to raise the threshold for inheritance tax (now shelved for the time being).
However, latest Treasury figures show the move may not have been the success the politicians hoped for. Around 5,400 non-doms paid the levy in its first year, raising around £162million in tax – far less than originally expected.
Furthermore, it is estimated that 11.5 per cent of non-doms left the UK in 2008/09, costing the government around £800million in lost revenue, since non-doms still pay tax on any UK earnings, not to mention property and indirect taxes. While their individual reasons for leaving are not known, there will be an assumption that the new charge played a part.
In other words, from a financial point of view, the levy has been a failure. But some of the tax’s supporters may argue there is a moral issue here – when other people in the UK are being asked to pay higher taxes, it is unfair for non-doms to miss out.
Either way, the results of the levy do show that introducing new taxes or raising existing ones can be counterproductive – and if the intention is to increase revenue, the government must ensure their proposals do not end up costing the country more than it gains.
For more information, please visit www.glazers.co.uk
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( 3 / 702 )There’s some downbeat news on the results front this morning from big name retailers.
Tesco reported a rise of just 0.6 per cent in like-for-like sales in the six week to 8 January 2011 on the same period 12 months ago. Halfords saw like-for-like sales fall 6.6 per cent in the last 13 weeks of 2010 compared with the same quarter in 2009.
At Dixons, like-for-like sales fell two per cent in the 12 weeks to 8 January on the year before while sales at Argos were down 4.9 per cent on a like-for-like basis during the 18 weeks to 1 January when compared with the same period of 2009.
The figures underline British Retail Consortium data released earlier this week, which showed that sales last month declined by 0.3 per cent on a like-for-like basis compared with December 2009.
Early and severe winter weather, including weeks of snow, has, of course, played its part in hitting sales, with shoppers either unwilling – or unable – to hit the High Streets.
But consumer confidence has also clearly taken a battering. Many workers in the public sector, where the cuts axe is set to fall in earnest this year, will be wondering whether they will have a job in a few months and Manchester City Council today gave a taste of things to come as it announced plans to slash its workforce by 2,000 – 17 per cent – to meet savings targets.
Many of those workers will not have been alone in reining in spending in the run-up to Christmas in anticipation of rainy days to come, as prices rising faster than many people’s earnings also put a squeeze on disposable income. Retailers are likely to be bracing themselves for more of what Argos sums up as “challenging and volatile” trading conditions.
For more information, please visit www.glazers.co.uk
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( 3 / 498 )There are some hard-hitting headlines concerning Barclays' boss Bob Diamond this morning, following his assured performance before the Commons Treasury Committee yesterday.
“No apologies. No restraint. No shame,” says the Independent. “Super-rich bank boss Diamond defiant,” says the Daily Express. And the Daily Mail’s comment column on his appearance before MPs is titled: “A victory for greed that imperils us all”.
Those headlines might make uncomfortable reading for some of us but Mr Diamond is clearly made from sterner stuff, showing, perhaps, how he has achieved what is estimated to be a £100 million fortune and multi-million pound annual pay package.
He’s made a remarkable success of his career and that’s to be admired. But the man or woman in the street, who may have lost their job, their home or wonders what the future holds for them financially, thanks to the consequences of some risky decision-making by the banks, may find his comments a little hard to swallow.
Mr Diamond told MPs: “The biggest issue is how do we put some of the blame game behind us? There was a period of remorse and apology for banks – that period needs to be over.”
There are some who may be thinking that period should never be over: that the misery and economic uncertainty of the last few years should be a reminder set in the stone for the banks that they need to do better by their customers.
It’s a lesson that the taxpayer-owned Royal Bank of Scotland and its NatWest subsidiary do not yet seem to have learned. Yesterday, the Financial Services Authority fined them £2.8 million for failing to deal properly with customers’ routine complaints.
At the same time, there have been reports that RBS's chief executive, Stephen Hester, is to get a substantial bonus for his work in 2010. Mr Diamond’s own response on his bonus was to say: "I haven't been offered a bonus yet…I would discuss [waiving] it with my family."
At a time when it would seem appropriate for the banks to show some sensitivity and understanding towards their customers and the country as a whole, as they seek to rebuild battered reputations, many will be thinking that not much has, in fact, changed in their approach. And if not much is changing, what’s to stop the turmoil of recent years happening again?
Perhaps they would agree with John Mann, the Labour MP for Bassetlaw, as he responded to Mr Diamond: “You are in denial about the taxpayers' support for you; denying a lack of competition in the industry; you're denying customer satisfaction; you're denying the lack of support for small businesses... the emperor is wearing no clothes."
For more information, please visit www.glazers.co.uk
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( 3 / 689 )As the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) today releases its latest Quarterly Economic Survey, one area in which both manufacturing and services – a sector where weaknesses elsewhere could have “adverse consequences”, the BCC warns – are doing well is exports.
Overseas sales and orders rose during the last quarter, reaching their strongest level since Q4 1994 for manufacturing while the services sector figures suggest exports returning to levels not seen since before the recession in 2007.
So it seems timely that Lord Green today takes up his new post as Trade and Investment Minister. The former HSBC group chairman will be responsible for ensuring delivery of a cross-government trade strategy – to be presented as a White Paper in the spring – as well as attracting international investment.
Lord Green says he is looking forward to “supporting businesses of all kinds, large or small, innovative or traditional, in goods or in services" as they explore the opportunities offered by international markets.
He also says the UK must be positioned as “the most hospitable and welcoming destination for productive international investment.”
Our economy at home is intrinsically linked to trade and investment. Last year, exports represented more than a quarter of our GDP – contributing to the UK’s current status as the world’s sixth largest exporter – while inward investment created 94,000 UK jobs.
Yesterday, British and Chinese companies signed deals worth a total of £2.6 billion, highlighting just how crucial overseas markets – both developed and developing – are to our economic health.
As is traditional when taking on a new job, Lord Green says this is an “exciting and challenging” time to join the government and few would disagree. British businesses will be watching with interest to see how he responds to the challenge of making sure that trade and investment play a key role in driving the UK economy’s growth.
For more information, please visit www.glazers.co.uk
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