Simpson, CEO of UKH, agreed that the budget didn’t deliver on the hopes of the pub sector, but he remains more positive about the future direction of travel.
“The reason I came out of last week, not positive about the day, but about the future, it was the first Budget delivered by this parliament where to the extent the Government had any money to spare, they spent it on us, and it came with a narrative from the Government that they’re going to do that again over the next few budgets.”
Speaking to the MA editor Ed Bedington in the wake of the budget he said the sector needed to see the VAT’s the Problem campaign as an “ongoing goal” and highlighted that the movement had achieved significant success in just five months, normalising the discussion around VAT reduction.
“Did we get a VAT cut now, no, but I think we’re much closer to getting one now than we were five months ago. So my big lesson to the sector is we’ve got to carry on campaigning. If we make the mistake of saying this is rubbish and doesn’t win us anything, I don’t think that’s the right thing.”
He said we now have a Government we could talk to, as opposed to the previous administration in which the sector felt like “collateral damage” the Government were willing to accept.
“I do think we can campaign for increasingly positive things for the sector, and frankly if we don’t think that’s the case, what’s the point? We’ve got to keep going.”
He defended the momentum of the campaign, and urged the industry not to turn on itself, but to keep the pressure on Government to ensure a more positive direction of travel.
To hear more from Simpson on the outcome of the budget, watch the video above.