Small firms last night hailed a package of ‘game-changing’ measures to boost Britain.
Jeremy Hunt vowed to ‘end the scourge of late payments’ to small suppliers alongside plans to offer relief on business rates and cut taxes for the self-employed.
The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) said it would ‘help build future prosperity’.
But big business – offered no assistance with rates – was not so impressed with one chief executive bemoaning ‘a missed opportunity’.
The Chancellor said firms trying to bid for Government contracts over £5million will have to prove they pay invoices within an average of 55 days from next April. That ‘will reduce progressively to 30 days’, Hunt added.
Support: Jeremy Hunt vowed to ‘end the scourge of late payments’ to small suppliers alongside plans to offer relief on business rates and cut taxes for the self-employed
He also set out business rate relief worth £4.3billion over the next five years.
Some retail, hospitality and leisure companies will also benefit from an extension of a 75 per cent rates relief scheme – the move saving a typical independent pub over £12,800 next year. And Hunt is to shake up of national insurance.
The Chancellor said the changes would save 2m self-employed people £350 a year from April.
He announced plans to cut Class 4 NI contributions from 9 per cent to 8 per cent and will scrap the Class 2 band.
FSB policy chair Tina McKenzie said: ‘This game-changing small business package shows the prioritisation of pro-growth measures where they will do most good, while getting the best bang for the taxpayer buck.
Small businesses, and the 16m people who work for them, are the route to future growth that will raise living standards.’
But large firms face a rise in business rates. Marks and Spencer boss Stuart Machin said: ‘The Chancellor missed an opportunity to fix the broken business rates system’.
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