The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) is warning that tax rises announced in the Budget are undermining investment among UK companies.
In a speech today, CBI chief executive Rain Newton-Smith will warn that the measures chancellor Rachel Reeves announced last month have made it harder for businesses to “take a chance” on hiring new people.
“Across the board, in so many sectors, margins are being squeezed and profits are being hit by a tough trading environment that just got tougher," Newton-Smith will say, according to copies of the speech shared with newspapers.
She will argue that profits "aren’t just extra money for companies to stuff in a pillowcase" but "when you hit profits, you hit competitiveness, you hit investment, you hit growth".
Reeves, according to leaked responses, will tell the group there was "no alternative" to tax rises as the government needed to invest in the NHS and other areas.