Pub landlord claims business rates changes 'not enough'
Pubs and live music venues in England will benefit from 15% off their business rates bills from April
A pub landlord who led a campaign to bar Labour MPs in protest at rising taxes said business rates changes were a "discount on a bill rise" and did not go "far enough".
Pubs and live music venues in England will benefit from 15% off their business rates bills from April, after warnings from the sector that changes from November's autumn budget would lead to mass closures and job losses.
Other hospitality businesses such as hotels, restaurants and cafes will not receive additional support despite their own concerns over soaring tax bills.
Andy Lennox, who runs The Old Thatch in Wimborne, Dorset, said the wider hospitality sector had been "excluded" from the measures.
Mr Lennox, who led a campaign to bar Labour MPs from hospitality venues in protest at rising taxes, told the Press Association: "We have been given a discount on a bill rise. This is a bill that we can't afford to pay anyway.
"It's been discounted down, but it's still going up.
"And essentially, we have always argued that there needs to be meaningful tax reform in line with Europe, so VAT cut to 13%.
"So ultimately, whilst it is welcomed that the Government is listening, we don't think it goes far enough."
The Treasury's intervention comes after an intensifying backlash from industry bosses and MPs over impending tax increases.
Another pub landlord said the Government's business rates changes were "woefully not enough".
Matthew Todd, landlord of The Wonston Arms near Winchester, Hampshire, said: "I don't see how it's going to save the venues that are going to close - it's actually a very small amount that's being talked about. It's woefully not enough, I'm afraid."
In the budget, the Treasury announced changes to business rates which introduced a lower multiplier used to calculate the commercial property tax.
This was more than offset by the removal of a Covid-era 40% discount to business rates bills for hospitality, leisure and retail businesses, as well as new property valuations.
The Chancellor introduced transitional relief to manage increases to rates bills over the next three years after the removal of sector discounts.
However, industry bodies UKHospitality and the British Beer and Pub Association (BBPA) had warned that pub business rates bills would still increase by an average of 15%, or £1,400, in April without an intervention.
Speaking to the Press Association, Mr Todd said: "The business rates valuations that have been implemented this year from April 1 are completely flawed, so they have to stop and that process has to be reviewed and changed.
"For example, my pub has gone up by 87% in its business rate valuation. Where does that come from?
"That's the bit that is fundamentally flawed, and that's the permanent change that needs to happen - acknowledge that the new rateable values they're imposing on high street pubs and small businesses are completely flawed.
"And don't implement them ahead of looking at a way of calculating realistic and viable business rate valuations for pubs going forward."