Hospitality chiefs warn Reeves of carnage over Budget tax hikes

Published

10 months ago

November 9, 2024

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Rachel Reeves will this weekend be told by some of Britain’s biggest hospitality groups that the tax hikes imposed in last month’s Budget risk triggering a tsunami of job losses across the sector.

Sky News has learnt that dozens of bosses from pub, restaurant and hotel operators have agreed to sign a letter to the chancellor calling her inaugural fiscal statement “regressive in [its] impact on lower earners” and warning that “business closures and job losses within a year” are inevitable.

The letter, an early draft of which has been seen by Sky News, has been circulated among executives from Stonegate Group, Britain’s biggest pubs operator; a division of the company which owns Wagamama; Burger King; the Hotel du Vin and Malmaison hotel chains; and Tossed, the high street salad bar operator.

One signatory cautioned this weekend that the contents of the final letter had yet to be finalised and could change.

Collectively, the signatories employ tens of thousands of people across Britain, although the final tally was unclear on Saturday as UK Hospitality, the trade body coordinating the letter, was still canvassing members about their willingness to put their names to it.

In the letter, they repeat a warning that steep increases in employers’ national insurance bills, coupled with the hike in the national living wage, will cost the hospitality industry close to £3.5bn annually.

They also say that the commercial viability of “important public sector catering contracts for schools, hospitals and prisons” will be thrown into question.

Ms Reeves said in the Budget that the Treasury would yield an extra £25bn annually from the employer NICs (national insurance contributions) increase, prompting a barrage of criticism from retailers and hospitality companies which have large numbers of part-time employees.

“The changes to the NICs threshold are not just unsustainable for our businesses but inevitably regressive in their impact on lower earners,” this weekend’s letter is expected to say.

“Unquestionably they will lead to business closures and job losses within a year.

“The increase in employer contributions would have been damaging enough but changing the threshold is far more damaging.

“Without action, many businesses will fail, costing many of the sector’s 3.5 million jobs.”

Among other potential signatories to the letter are said to be Pizza Hut’s largest UK franchisee, Oakman Inns, Tortilla Mexican Grill, Fuller’s and Elior UK, the contract catering giant.

The Revel Collective, which recently changed its name from Revolution Bars Group, is also among those asked to sign it.

The letter calls on the chancellor to create a new employer NICs band of 5% for workers earning between £5,000 – the new lower tax threshold – and £9,100, and to exempt employers from paying NICs on lower-band taxpayers who work fewer than 20 hours a week.

It also asks for an early implementation of business rates reform, or for the Treasury to reverse the temporary increase in VAT from 17.5% to 20%.

“Your stated intent is to rebalance the tax burden away from high street businesses, yet this change to NICs does the opposite, balancing the books on the backs of the high street businesses which provide jobs to all in society, nationwide, while sparing businesses that used technology to shed jobs,” the draft said.

“We understand that these proposals come at a financial cost, but we are absolutely firm in our belief that the business closures and job losses that would result from inaction would be substantially more expensive, for the economy, for society and for the public finances.”

Sky News revealed this week that some of Britain’s biggest food retailers believed that price rises from next April, when the tax changes come into effect, were inevitable.

Executives at Marks & Spencer and J Sainsbury both subsequently confirmed that possibility when they reported financial results to the City, while Tim Martin, the veteran chairman of JD Wetherspoon, said: “All hospitality businesses, we believe, plan to increase prices as a result [of the Budget].”

Hospitality groups are understood to have told their respective trade association that they may be forced to pass on some of the higher taxes in price increases, although the draft letter also highlighted the belief that customers “are at the end of their ability to pay more”.

The pessimism which has engulfed parts of corporate Britain since the Budget has taken senior Labour figures by surprise, and has thrown into sharp relief the triumphalism expressed by the new government after last month’s International Investment Summit.

In an interview with Sky News last weekend, the chancellor said “businesses will now have to make a choice, whether they will absorb that [employer NICs increase] through efficiency and productivity gains, whether it will be through lower profits or perhaps through lower wage growth”.

Pointedly, she did not highlight the prospect of higher prices for consumers, with some bosses already publicly warning of a renewed spike in UK inflation next year.

Sky News revealed on Monday that Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, had faced widespread anger from chief executives on a call to discuss the Budget.

Nick Mackenzie, the chief executive of Greene King, highlighted on the call that the increase in employers’ national insurance contributions would cause “a £20m shock” to the company, while Fullers’ Simon Emeny warned that it would be forced to halve annual investment from £60m to £30m as a result of increased cost pressures.

Rami Baitieh, the Morrisons chief executive, told Mr Reynolds that the Budget had exacerbated “an avalanche of costs” for businesses next year.

This weekend, UK Hospitality declined to comment on the draft letter.

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Three die and a fourth in serious condition in hospital after helicopter crash on Isle of Wight

Published

3 hours ago

August 25, 2025

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Three die and a fourth in serious condition in hospital after helicopter crash on Isle of Wight

Three people have died following a helicopter crash during a flying lesson on the Isle of Wight.

A fourth person is in hospital in a serious condition following the incident, according to Hampshire Police.

Officers were called to the scene of a “helicopter that had come down” off Shanklin Road near Ventnor at 9.24am on Monday, the force said.

A spokesman for the aircraft’s owner Northumbria Helicopters said G-OCLV – which is listed as a Robinson R44 II helicopter – was involved in the accident during a flying lesson.

Helicopter ‘spiralled out of sight’ – live updates

Four people, including the pilot, were on board the aircraft, which departed nearby Sandown Airport at 9am, the company also said in a statement.

A critical care team, including a doctor and specialist paramedic, was also sent to the crash site, Hants and Isle of Wight Air Ambulance added, alongside fire engines and other emergency vehicles.

The Air Accidents Investigation Branch confirmed it was alerted to the incident and is sending a team to investigate. A major incident was declared but has since been stood down.

A spokesperson for Hampshire and Isle of Wight Air Ambulance said in a statement: “We have treated and airlifted one patient to the Major Trauma Centre, University Hospital Southampton. Our thoughts are with them, and everyone involved in today’s incident.”

Darren Toogood, editor and publisher at the Island Echo, told Sky News presenter Kamali Melbourne the helicopter crashed on a “significantly busy, high-speed road” between the village of Godshill and the seaside town of Shanklin.

“It was on one of the first flights of the day,” he said.

“It’s a bank holiday weekend in August on the Isle of Wight. It’s an incredibly busy area. Lots of tourists down at the moment. It appears no vehicles were involved, which is incredible, given how busy this road would have been this morning.”

A witness, Leigh Goldsmith, told the Isle of Wight County Press she saw the helicopter “spiralling” before crashing into a hedge as she drove along the road.

Police have closed Shanklin Road, blocking it off with several emergency vehicles, and are warning people to avoid the area.

Northumbria Helicopters said it is “giving its full cooperation to the authorities investigating this incident”.

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Ten organisations write urgent letter to home secretary over violence against women and girls strategy

Published

6 hours ago

August 25, 2025

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Ten organisations write urgent letter to home secretary over violence against women and girls strategy

Ten child protection organisations have written an urgent letter to the home secretary expressing concern about the omission of child sexual abuse from the government’s violence against women and girls strategy, following a Sky News report.

Groups including the NSPCC, Barnardo’s and The Internet Watch Foundation wrote to Yvette Cooper to say that violence against women and girls (VAWG) and child sexual abuse are “inherently and deeply connected”, suggesting any “serious strategy” to address VAWG needs to focus on child sexual abuse and exploitation.

The letter comes after Sky News revealed an internal Home Office document, titled Our draft definition of VAWG, which said that child sexual abuse and exploitation is not “explicitly within the scope” of their strategy, due to be published in September.

Responding to Sky News’ original report, Poppy Eyre, who was sexually abused and raped by her grandfather when she was four, said: “VAWG is – violence against women and girls. If you take child sexual abuse out of it, where are the girls?”

The Centre of Expertise on Child Sexual Abuse, which is funded by the Home Office and a signatory to the letter, estimates 500,000 children in England and Wales are sexually abused every year.

The NSPCC “welcome” the government’s pledge to halve VAWG in a decade, but is “worried that if they are going to fulfil this commitment, the strategy absolutely has to include clear deliverable objectives to combat child sexual abuse and exploitation too”, the head of policy, Anna Edmundson, told Sky News.

She warned the government “will miss a golden opportunity” and the needs of thousands of girls will be “overlooked” if child sexual abuse and exploitation is not “at the heart of its flagship strategy”.

The government insists the VAWG programme will include action to tackle child sexual abuse, but says it also wants to create a distinctive plan to “ensure those crimes get the specialist response they demand”.

“My message to the government is that if you’re going to make child sexual abuse a separate thing, we need it now,” Poppy told Sky News.

Rape Crisis, which is one of the largest organisations providing support to women in England and Wales, shares these concerns.

It wants plans to tackle child sexual abuse to be part of the strategy, and not to sit outside it.

“If a violence against women and girls strategy doesn’t include sexual violence towards girls, then it runs the risk of being a strategy for addressing some violence towards some females, but not all,” chief executive Ciara Bergman said.

A Home Office spokesperson said the government is “working tirelessly to tackle the appalling crimes of violence against women and girls and child sexual exploitation and abuse, as part of our Safer Streets mission”.

“We are already investing in new programmes and introducing landmark laws to overhaul the policing and criminal justice response to these crimes, as well as acting on the recommendations of Baroness Casey’s review into group-based Child Sexual Exploitation, and the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse,” they added.

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More than 80% of shoplifting offences result in no charge – as number of unsolved cases soars

Published

6 hours ago

August 25, 2025

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More than 80% of shoplifting offences result in no charge - as number of unsolved cases soars

Hundreds of shoplifting cases have gone unsolved every day, with the number of unsolved incidents rising by more than 40,000 over the past year.

New figures show that 289,464 cases of shoplifting were shut by police without a suspect in England and Wales in the year to March 2025, according to House of Commons library analysis.

Of all shoplifting cases, more than half (55%) were closed without a suspect identified, while fewer than one in five (18%) led to someone being charged.

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The data shows the number of cases closed without a suspect has also risen significantly on the previous 12 months, with 245,337 cases shut by police forces without a suspect being identified in 2023-24, a rise of more than 40,000.

The analysis, produced for the Liberal Democrats, suggests that on average, 793 shoplifting offences went unsolved every day.

Senior Conservative politicians have told Sky News that the figures “explain why Britain feels lawless”, and are urging ministers to scrap plans to largely end the use of short prison sentences, in favour of people serving time in the community.

What else does the data show?

The data covered all police forces in England and Wales, except for Humberside, but also included the British Transport Police.

It revealed the Metropolitan Police had the worst record, with 76.9% of its 93,705 shoplifting cases being closed with nobody identified as a suspect. Just 5.9% of shoplifting incidents recorded in the capital and the wider region resulted in a charge.

While the data has shown the number of unsolved cases is on the rise, it also revealed that the total number of shoplifting offences has increased dramatically, too.

In 2023-24, 444,022 cases of shoplifting were recorded. But in 2024-25, this rose to 530,643, a record high since the practice of recording the data nationally began in 2002-03.

Overall, 2,071,156 offences of all types went unsolved in the 2024-25 year. This means, on average each day, 5,674 crimes were committed that went on to be closed without a suspect. Only 7.3% of all crimes recorded resulted in somebody being charged or summoned.

The Lib Dems have repeated their calls for police and crime commissioners – elected politicians who have authority over each police force – to be scrapped. They believe the money spent on these would be better invested in frontline policing, and that police boards, made up of local councillors and other individuals, could replace them.

Lisa Smart, the party’s home affairs spokesperson, said that the data reveals an “absolute scandal” because it shows that “thousands of innocent victims are being left without the justice they deserve” every day.

She added: “The previous Conservative government left behind a legacy of failure, but the Labour government has not been quick enough to address the unsolved crime epidemic – particularly as shoplifting spirals out of control.”

Tories: There should be a ‘zero tolerance approach’ to shoplifting

Meanwhile, the shadow home secretary pointed out that shoplifting has risen by 20% under Labour, and that ministers show “no signs of gripping it”.

Chris Philp told Sky News: “The vast majority of criminals aren’t even caught – and Labour are now proposing to abolish prison sentences of under a year, so even the few that get caught won’t suffer any real punishment.”

He has called for a “zero tolerance approach” and the greater use of technology, such as facial recognition technology, so that “Labour’s shoplifting epidemic can be stopped”.

Earlier this month, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announced a significant expansion of the use of facial recognition tech by police forces in England and Wales, with 10 new vans being rolled out – though the move was criticised by civil liberties groups.

Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary, said the “damning stats explain why Britain feels lawless”.

He told Sky News: “Starmer’s plan to scrap prison sentences for shoplifters will only make this worse. We need the authorities to go after these criminals and lock them up for much longer to keep the public safe.”

The government has defended the proposals to largely end the use of shorter sentences, as recommended by the independent sentencing review, carried out earlier this year by former Conservative justice secretary David Gauke.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “Without further action, we will run out of prison places in months, courts would halt trials and the police [would] cancel arrests. That is why we are overhauling sentencing to make sure we always have the prison places needed to keep the country safe.”