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Paul Askew, Chef Patron of The Art School and Barnacle in Liverpool, says:

I have said this before leading into budgets and how important they are for the opportunity to embrace positive change from the government.

But this time, it’s more important than ever that Rachel Reeves, Keir Starmer and the rest of those currently in power are listening to the UK’s hospitality industry.

Thousands of business owners, from restaurants and bars to pubs and hotels, from night clubs and food halls to events spaces and pop-ups, all face challenges of a magnitude not seen since the pandemic. Indeed, the since the last budget, increased National Insurance contributions have saddled the entire sector with more costs whilst facing prevailing headwinds of high food inflation, high utility bills, ongoing debts incurred from the pandemic and high living costs for the population affecting what people are willing to spend. On top of this, we have lost as many as 130,000 jobs in UK hospitality since NICs were increased.

There has already been a spate of closures across the UK in 2025, many of which were  preventable but for the dire situations these businesses faced, and this situation is not going away anytime soon; so to avoid even more businesses collapsing, supply chains failing and the loss of skilled staff, we must see positive and effective changes in this budget, for example on VAT.

We have been asking governments to look at VAT on food for more than a decade.  If I buy a side of beef and I have an artisan take that off the bone, make stock from the bone and create a dish with it, I have to pay 20% on that dish. I haven’t paid VAT on the way in because there’s no VAT on food, but the minute I prepare it, I have to pay 20%. Otherwise, what is happening is people buy more and more bought-in things, pre-portioned food – and it’s de-skilling the industry.

In this budget there must be:

• Lower business rates to revive empty high streets
• Fix NIC to boost jobs, especially for young people and incentives to bring them into hospitality
• Cut VAT on hospitality to help drive investment and make the UK competitive, especially compared to European countries

We wait with baited breath for what this government will announce in the budget.