Industry orgs react to chancellor’s recent “mini budget”

The chancellor’s mini budget, with its strong emphasis on economic growth, is a gamble, but offers hope to small builders, says the Federation of Master Builders (FMB).

Brian Berry, chief executive of the FMB said: “The strong focus to ‘get Britain building’ by unlocking government surplus land and extending the stamp duty threshold to help prospective house buyers is a welcome boost in a tough market. However, at a time when we are building fewer homes than needed, more action is required to boost delivery of more high quality homes from small, local builders.”

Berry continued “Although not announced by the chancellor in his statement, we’re pleased to see a small step forward in improving the energy efficiency of homes in the chancellor’s ‘Growth Plan’, which will incentivise energy companies to help customers upgrade their homes. However, what’s really needed now to boost local growth and skills is a fully fledged national retrofit strategy focusing on the UK’s 29 million leaky homes.”

WorldSkills UK, an organisation which supports young people – including young tiling apprentices – across the world, via competitions-based training, assessment and benchmarking has also weighed in on the announcement. CEO Dr Neil Bentley-Gockmann OBE said: “WorldSkills UK welcomes the chancellor’s unrelenting focus on growth and to make the UK one of the most competitive economies in the world.

“High-quality technical education and apprenticeships help UK firms attract inward investment, in turn creating the high-value jobs that will be vital in achieving the Government’s objectives.

“We are already working hard with our partners to bring international best practice in skills back to the UK to help level up our economy. We will continue to work with all regions and nations supporting the new investment zones and helping deliver the world-class skills needed to drive growth across the UK.

“As Team UK showcases its skills across the world this autumn, we will be gathering insights on cutting edge skills, such as industrial electronics and cyber security, to help make our technical education world-class and show the world that the UK is the place to invest.”