Conservative response to Labour announcement on high streets

Responding, Jake Berry MP, Minister of State for the Northern Powerhouse and Local Growth, said:

“Jeremy Corbyn would wreck the economy, tax small businesses and scare off the investment needed to help our high streets, meaning more boarded up shops and fewer jobs.  

“We will deliver Brexit by 31 October so that we can get on with levelling up opportunities across our country and breathe new life into high streets and town centres.”

ENDS

Notes to editors

• John McDonnell would raise corporation tax on 1 million small businesses, despite Corbyn promising not to. Labour’s manifesto contained a pledge to hike the small profits rate to 21 per cent, despite Jeremy Corbyn saying in April 2017 ‘we will not raise the small business corporation tax rate’ (Jeremy Corbyn, Speech to FSB, 11 April, 2017, link; Labour press, 10 May 2017, link).

• Labour’s manifesto pledged to raise corporation tax by seven per cent, costing over 100,000 jobs. Labour’s manifesto states that it would raise ‘the headline rate to … 26 per cent from 2020-21’. Increasing the headline rate of corporation tax will have a significant impact on jobs. Independent experts have estimated that if the rate rises to 24 per cent, this would cost 100,000 jobs (Labour Party, Funding Britain’s Future, May 2017, p.6, link; CPS, 8 February 2015, link).

• Labour’s anti-business policies would further damage our high streets. Labour’s Shadow Chancellor said that business is ‘the real enemy’ and said it’s part of his job description to overthrow capitalism (The Times, 21 May 2018, link; John McDonnell, POA Conference, 12 May 2011, archived).

Conservatives are supporting our high streets:

• We have launched a £3.6 billion Towns Fund to improve local transport links and boost broadband connectivity. The funding will support an initial 100 towns by improving both transport and digital infrastructure (Prime Minister’s Office, Speech at Manchester Science and Industry Museum, 27 July 2019, link).

• We have cut small retailers’ bills by a third, taking 600,000 businesses out of paying business rates altogether, so our local businesses are able to provide more local jobs to their communities. Our £1.5 billion package announced at the 2018 Budget to support high streets builds on our strong record of over £13 billion of business rates support since 2016 (MHCLG, Press Release, 24 January 2019, link; MHCLG, Press Release, 12 June 2019, link).

• We are backing community leaders with £675 million of funding to help modernise their high streets and town centres. The Future High Streets Fund will empower leaders on the ground who know their communities best to transforming our town centres into the thriving community hubs of the future (MHCLG, Press Release, 26 December 2018, link).

• We are relaxing planning rules to support new homes on our high streets to transform them into community hubs where people work, live and shop. There are currently over 27,000 premises lying vacant in England’s town centres, if just a fraction of these vacant premises were turned into homes, thousands more people could have a roof over their head. We are also linking landlords to vacant retail units so we transform empty spaces into much needed housing for local people (MHCLG, Press Release, 7 November 2018, link).

Labour’s record shows they can’t be trusted to deliver:

• Labour forced up business rates by stealth. Under Labour the average business rates bill in England rose from £6,796 a year in 1997-98 to £12,145 in 2009-10. In real terms, this represented a rise from £9,196 to £12,145 a year – despite the fact that business rates are supposed to be pegged to RPI inflation (Conservative Party, Campaign Guide 2010, p.310).

• Labour encouraged out-of-town shopping centres. Labour abolished a ‘needs test’ in the planning system which allowed councils to block out-of-town shopping developments if there was deemed to be a lack of demand. Labour even acknowledged that this would lead to more out-of-town developments (Conservative Party, Campaign Guide 2010, p.129).

• Labour made it difficult to park in town centres. Labour forced councils to push up parking charges, discouraged competition between town centres and restricted the number of new car park spaces that councils could provide in new town centre developments (Planning Policy Guidance 13: Transport, March 2001, link).

• Under Labour, the post office network shrunk by 37 per cent. When Labour entered office in 1997-98, there were 19,008 post offices, When they left in 2009-10, there were 11,905, meaning 7.103 post offices closed under Labour’s watch (House of Commons Library, Post office numbers, 9 August 2018, link).

• Bus fares rose almost three times faster under Labour every year than under the Conservatives. In 1997-2010, bus fares rose by an average of 1.9 per cent each year in real terms. This is almost three times more than in 2010-17, when fares have risen by an average of 0.7 per cent each year in real terms (DfT, Transport Statistics Great Britain: 2017 tables, 23 November 2017, link).