91探花

鈥淒ear Mr. Prime Minister,

Business creates the wealth that funds every public service, so every government department should see helping business succeed as part of its job.鈥�

鈥� Anne Cantelo, Founder of Onyx Media and Communications

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The first thing you need to know about running a business in Britain today is that鈥�

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Nearly half of private-sector employment is in businesses with fewer than 50 employees, yet political debate too often assumes businesses can fund specialist teams to manage compliance and have steady cash flow and large profit margins. SMEs and startups often have one founder or a tiny leadership team worrying about sales, recruitment, tax, regulation and customers.

Tax increases for employers have to be funded. That means freezing recruitment or wages, increasing prices or cutting suppliers. These are all measures that impact growth. Fantastic businesses fail not through lack of ambition or ideas, but because simply keeping the business functioning can become overwhelming.

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The biggest challenge facing UK founders that politicians don鈥檛 completely understand is鈥�

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Cashflow. The government could use its teeth to reduce the problem significantly. Some of the worst payers are large corporations, many of which benefit from government contracts. I know from experience that 60 or even 90-day payment terms are still common.

Instead of yet another 鈥榗ode鈥� or initiative the government should make prompt payment a condition of doing business with the public sector: large companies should automatically be excluded from public contracts unless 90% of supplier invoices are paid within 30 days.

Small businesses shouldn鈥檛 provide interest-free working capital to much larger companies. Government has enormous purchasing power; using it to change payment behaviour and that would transform cashflow for thousands of SMEs.

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The promise I would most like to see your government keep is鈥�

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To be more supportive of growth. Test every major policy affecting business against a simple question: will this make somebody more or less likely to start, grow, employ people or invest in a business in Britain?

I鈥檇 also like HMRC to bring far more real-world business experience into their decision-making. An otherwise viable business can have a short-term cashflow problem. An inflexible decision that pushes it into insolvency destroys the business and jobs; it also means the Treasury loses tax that might have been collected if that business had been given reasonable time to pay.

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Please don鈥檛鈥�

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Mistake government activity for economic progress. I鈥檝e seen government from both sides, working within it and subsequently running businesses and advising private-sector organisations. Governments are good at creating strategies, initiatives, taskforces and announcements, then measuring meetings held and people consulted. Those measures are largely irrelevant.

Businesses measure success differently: customers won, products launched, exports made and profits generated. Government should judge business policy by outcomes too. What impact have its policies had on growth? Are insolvencies rising or falling? Are businesses of different sizes employing more or fewer people? Measure what actually matters. E.g. Do they know these top line figures for the impact of the rise in employer NI contributions?

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What would make the UK a more attractive place to build and scale a company is鈥�

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A stable, proportionate tax and regulatory environment that rewards growth. The simultaneous increases in employer NI and the minimum wage were disastrous for many small businesses. Where did the government expect them to find the money? It demonstrated how poorly the reality of tight margins is understood by those making the decisions.

We also need a fairer international tax system. British SMEs can compete for the same customers with multinationals whose structures enable profits to be taxed elsewhere. We should move towards taxing multinational profits where customers and economic activity are located. Small businesses shouldn鈥檛 find that, proportionately, the much bigger business next door has a lower tax burden.

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What gives me confidence in Britain鈥檚 future is鈥�

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The people building businesses here. Working in technology PR means I see innovations long before most people hear about them and have worked with some amazing people. I鈥檓 continually struck by the quality of British founders and their ability to identify problems and create commercial solutions.

AI in particular is creating opportunities for smaller companies to compete in ways that would have required enormous resources even a few years ago. Britain has the talent, universities, entrepreneurial culture and international reputation to benefit enormously from that, provided we create the right environment around them.

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What worries me most about the next five years鈥�

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We aren鈥檛 attracting the brightest and best into politics. Parliament has a recruitment problem. At 拢98,599, becoming an MP can mean a huge pay cut for high-calibre candidates. i.e., those who are at the top of their professions, running businesses or senior figures in public service, charities and unions.

I鈥檇 double MPs鈥� salaries. The additional 拢64m a year is tiny in government spending terms. In return, ban second jobs and outside interests.

I can hear the screams of protest, but this isn鈥檛 about rewarding current MPs. If a business isn鈥檛 attracting candidates of the calibre it needs, it changes what it鈥檚 offering. Parliament should too, or we will continue to witness a revolving door at Number 10.

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If you take one thing from this letter, let it be this:

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Give businesses confidence to plan. Entrepreneurs are risk-takers, but there is a difference between calculated commercial risk and unnecessary political uncertainty.

A founder should be worrying about whether customers will buy their product, whether they can beat their competitors and whether their next hire is the right one, not trying to second-guess what government might change next.

Create a stable, competitive environment and give businesses the space to do what they do best.

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听My hopes and dreams for 2030鈥�

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I hope by 2030 we鈥檝e stopped debating Brexit. Entrepreneurs understand that every disruption creates winners and losers. The winners are those who stop complaining first and start adapting fastest.

Innovations in AI, crypto and autonomous vehicles are moving very quickly, so present huge opportunities and challenges to governments. Outside the EU, Britain has greater freedom (agility and flexibility) to develop regulatory frameworks that nurture innovation while protecting society. But that advantage is worthless unless we act quickly enough to use it.

By 2030, I鈥檇 want government to point to measurable outcomes: investment, productivity, exports and successful British businesses. Entrepreneurs measure success by results. Government should too.