The UK Government has unveiled its Spring budget, which aims to grow the UK economy, halve inflation and decrease national debt. While no specific concessions were made for the events industry in the budget, leading figures have commented on the effect it will have on the sector.
The lack of industry-specific support continued to make the headlines for events-leaders. Simon Richards, finance director, beam and MD of Convenus said: “We called upon the Chancellor to provide support more specifically appropriate to our industry and its issues and there was none.
“That highlights again the need for everyone to support the work of all those who are endeavouring to build within government awareness and understanding of our industry and its distinctive issues. The SIC codes are increasingly important in this.
The notion of a growing economy, however, was noted by mia, though this was tempered somewhat by the realities that many organisers face when budgeting for events.
Kerrin MacPhie, chief executive, mia, said: “The spring budget demonstrated a clear shift in the government’s focus, reflecting less emphasis on stability and instead the encouragement of investment and growth.
“While our sector is recovering positively from the pandemic, many will be disappointed to see no developments to the Energy Bill Relief Scheme. From our research we’re aware that over three-quarters of organisations within the sector have had to increase their prices by an average 13% to mitigate rising energy costs, and it appears that there will be no short-term support for our sector in managing this challenge.”
“Despite the lack of financial support, it is encouraging to see that work is being done to increase the size of the UK workforce, supporting with the sector’s recruitment challenge. This has been well-documented since the EU Settlement Scheme came into place and we emerged from the pandemic, with more than half of organisations in the sector claiming to be understaffed earlier this year.”
As an industry that is ever-more focusing on sustainability and green goals, it’s no surprise that the lack of sustainable investment also came up. Michael Begley, managing director of venuedirectory.com commented; “As a committed advocate of increasing sustainability, I was disappointed that there was so little new investment to help us save the planet and nothing that would directly encourage more sustainable behaviour in the our industry.
“While I welcome £20bn towards carbon capture, usage and storage, and the £8.8bn over five years towards city region sustainable transport, we need this to be nationwide. What we really need is more incentives to encourage best practice and change behaviours, at home and in business.”
