This week we enter November and the budget due on the 26th looms large.  Unfortunately, the Labour Government’s mishandling of the public finances and the economy will mean only one thing - higher taxes.  They have put the nation into a doom loop of ever higher taxes, borrowing and debt, that damages the economy, resulting in having to repeat the cycle again.

The Chancellor has been put in a bind by Labour’s MPs who don’t understand the need to limit spending, including on the ever-growing benefits bill.  They don’t see the economic (and social) value in incentivising people into the world of work.

They also don’t understand that taxing business too much eventually hurts everyone, such as through damaging the economy, rising inflation, and rising unemployment. Gatwick Airport have raised serious concerns about plans to charge them significantly higher business rates, saying it could impact their £2.2 billion investments plans for a second runway.  Gatwick isn’t just very important to us locally in Crawley, it’s important regionally and nationally.

The UK’s largest supermarkets have warned that whacking them with much higher business rates will directly mean higher food prices.  This would particularly impact the least well-off as a higher percentage of their income is spent on food and essentials.    

Last year’s budget was a disaster, and I fear the lessons have not been learned.  As well as a tax on jobs, we had the removal of the Winter Fuel Allowance, that Labour’s new Deputy Leader Lucy Powell claimed at the time was essential to avoid a run on the Pound, and Crawley’s Labour MP said that if pensioners didn’t put the heating on as a result, then that’s their choice.

Ever higher taxes on businesses has consequences.  The UK has the highest government debt interest costs in the G7, because the markets have little faith the government is serious about living within its means.  The average household now pays £3,900 in tax just to fund government debt interest.  The only way to break this doom loop is to stop borrowing and reduce debt, and that means getting spending under control.  

Councillor Duncan Crow, Leader of Crawley Borough Council Conservative Group

29th October 2025