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The UK economy and you

ended 14. November 2024

Tomorrow morning at 07:00, we're getting the first estimate of how the UK economy performed during the third quarter (July to September 24) and have a lot of journalists asking us for views and input from SMEs and charities on the front lines. If you'd like the chance to be featured in the local, national and trade media tomorrow, tell us how things were for you during July to September. And how has business been during October and November to date? What are the main challenges you've faced (and are perhaps still facing) this year? Also, how has the Budget impacted your business? Has it been positive or negative? Are you making changes on the back of it? More generally, do you think this government truly values or understands small businesses and what's happening in the economy? Lastly, how confident are you feeling as we head towards Christmas? 

5 responses from the Newspage community

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Editor
Stephen Perkins
Managing Director at Yellow Brick Mortgages
These pre-Budget economic figures are weak enough in themselves and do not yet show the current landscape, where businesses were attacked in the Budget. The coming quarters will show the impact of job losses and the knock-on effect that has on economic productivity as companies seek to manage the pain.
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Tony Redondo
Founder at Cosmos Currency Exchange
I was willing to give the new Labour government the benefit of the doubt, encouraged by Starmer’s rhetoric. However, as rumours swirled around the first Labour Budget in 15 years, my clients began pausing their plans.
The October-November period has been challenging. The Budget raised private sector taxes to record levels. Businesses are shelving expansion plans, reducing staff, or even considering relocating abroad, with Dubai, Portugal, and Italy frequently mentioned.
While I’m not losing clients, trade volumes have dropped. The higher National Minimum Wage and Employers NI have put paid to our UK expansion plans. We are now focusing on expanding our overseas reach.
This government doesn’t understand or value small businesses. They view private enterprise as an adversary while extracting maximum resources to fund their own agendas.
I expect things to worsen and come to a head with the farmers, pensioners, landlords and above all, Trump so I am more hopeful for 2025.
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Faisal Sheikh
Managing Director at Monmouth Capital
With a huge majority in Parliament I secretly hoped the Chancellor would stand up and declare that she was going to:

• Merge National Insurance and Income Tax
• Scrap stamp duty on main home purchases to boost labour mobility
• Fix the accidental 60% Income Tax bands (£50k to £60k / £100k to £120k)
• Fix the Leaning Tower of Pensions Tax Relief
• Simplify IHT so it’s easier just to pay the damn tax rather than find ways around it

Instead, the Chancellor just moved the same old levers up a bit, down a bit, turned the same old dials slightly clockwise, slightly anticlockwise – with the main tangible outcome being that it’s more expensive than ever to hire workers, especially at the lower end of the pay scale!

It’s no good talking afterwards about the importance of reform, as the Prime Minister did last week.

Can’t shake the feeling this was a golden opportunity to rip the whole thing up and start over, they had years to prepare for it, and maybe they blew it.
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Kim McGinley
Director & Specialist Broker at VIBE Finance
July through September were a bit of a rollercoaster, especially in the specialist finance sector. For us, July and August were, quite worrylingy quiet. But then September arrived, and we’ve been so busy with new enquiries since then.

With investor interest picking up at the front end. It’s clear that, while some may be shying away, others view the current climate as a chance to get ahead in property investment.

The budget announcements have had an impact on SWAP rates with lenders pulling rates with little notice. Yet, UK property, as ever, shows its resilient side, attracting investors who see opportunity even in turbulent times. We’re not worried that the market will come to a standstill – it hasn’t, and it won’t. UK property has a way of weathering the storm, and there will always be those who fall away, as well as those who push forward with renewed interest.

Despite all the challenges, I’m heading towards the end of 2024 with cautious optimism - is the worst behind us?!
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Robin Waite
Founder of Fearless Business at Robin Waite Limited
Is the small business sector, particularly service/client businesses (such as coaching, consulting and freelancing) accross the board we noticed a slow down in economic activity. Particularly in August, it is usually a quieter month as it's the school summer holidays and our sector is dominated by hard-working parents.

The general consensus in my group of 165 business owners, a majority UK based, was that new enquiries were hard to come by and prospective clients even harder to convert into paying clients.

Many cited the election and budget as reasons for holding off new spending, especially in activites such as marketing and personal/self development.

While the chancellor did increase the employment allowance there's no material benefit to businesses with a wage bill under £300k per year and the taxes and levvies are now getting to a point where it's incredbly tough going to run a successful, profitable small business. SMEs are the lifebloof of our economy.