RUTH SUNDERLAND: Time to spice up Brand Britain

The days and weeks working as much as Budgets are at all times replete with hypothesis. The assertion on March 6 is extra consequential than most, for the nation and the Conservative Party, since it’s the Chancellor’s final large probability to woo the voters.

Jeremy Hunt has vowed to emulate Nigel Lawson, tax-reformer extraordinaire, who as Margaret Thatcher’s chancellor was one of many architects of the UK’s financial revolution within the Eighties.

Lord Lawson made errors, a few of them dangerous ones. But the boldness of his greatest strikes – specifically his reduce within the prime price of tax from 60 to 40 per cent – was that they set the world speaking about Britain.

He despatched out a strong message on the form of place the nation was, and aspired to be. Lawson’s Big Bang reforms to the City in 1986 turned London right into a honeypot for abroad capital and for the planet’s sharpest and most gifted younger bankers. We want an injection of that buccaneering spirit now. When requested his view of the UK at a dinner a number of days in the past, one of many City’s largest cheeses opined the issue shouldn’t be that the nation is perceived as a basket case, however as irrelevant.

On his travels, he mentioned no-one talks concerning the UK any extra. If Britain have been a enterprise, it might want a re-brand. Pessimistic beliefs concerning the London market are at risk of turning into self-fulfilling prophecies. When the chief government of a financial institution like Standard Chartered, whose shares are listed right here regardless of the worldwide nature of its enterprise, describes his valuation as ‘cr*p’, we’ve an issue.

Flying the flag: Nigel Lawson’s Big Bang reforms to the City in 1986 turned London right into a honeypot for abroad capital

Hunt desires to re-create a Lawsonian Big Bang in tech and life sciences. Energy and verve, nonetheless, have been draining out of UK markets. Ambitious founders aspire to a US itemizing the place they imagine they will earn more money, or to being purchased out. Defeatism is within the air.

A rebrand may sound woolly however I’ve three concrete recommendations for Hunt.

First, launch a Great British Isa.

Currently, there’s a ceiling of £20,000 a 12 months on these tax-efficient financial savings accounts.

Another £5,000 to be invested in UK shares could possibly be added to the yearly allowance. Broker Permier Miton has calculated it may elevate greater than £200billion in 5 years for British companies. That would decrease the price of capital, enhance liquidity on markets and carry firm share costs, encouraging companies to checklist right here. Second, scrap the ludicrous vacationer tax and permit overseas guests to reclaim VAT on their purchases. All it achieves is to drive consumers to locations equivalent to Paris or Milan.

Third, present respect for our engineering flagships, BAE Systems and Rolls-Royce. The latter, because the Mail on Sunday reported, is main the race to construct the UK’s first fleet of mini-nuclear energy stations, often known as Small Modular Reactors (SMRs).

But the ironically-named authorities physique Great British Nuclear is working a contest for the contract. So Rolls has to slug it out with abroad opponents.

Rolls-Royce, regardless of previous issues, is a reputation that resonates as synonymous with the very best of British. The firm, whose shares have risen 160 per cent prior to now 12 months, goes gangbusters underneath new boss Tufan Erginbilgic.

So why not crack on and award it that contract quick – as a result of except and till that occurs, potential export patrons might be asking why they need to purchase its SMRs whereas the UK’s personal authorities dithers.

Time to fly the flag with pleasure.