Conservative candidate for South Hunsley | Founder in the recruitment, manufacturing and motor industry
Kingston Upon Hull
Joined July 2011
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I must say, this outpouring of Labour MP’s about the demise of Poundland is astounding.
They have been repeatedly warned that spurious NI increases, the Employment Rights Bill and large increases in NMW would push a significant number of struggling businesses over the edge.
Yet here they all are pretending to be shocked, claiming they going to engage with unions, and they can’t quite understand why the owners would rather just shut the company than deal with their idiotic policies and demands.
“Show me the incentive and I’ll show you the outcome.”
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
NEW: Labour demand answers after seeing the consequences of their own actions.
NEW: Andy Burnham has demanded answers about the insolvency of Poundland, which has its largest distribution centre in his constituency of Makerfield.
The PM tells @Telegraph: "If there was a potential owner to avoid this that hasn’t been accepted, then the Business Secretary and I want to know why that is the case. We stand ready to support the workforce however we can.”
Burnham wants to know why Gordon Brothers, the chain's owner, rejected a solvent bid from Ireland’s Martin Property Group for the entire Poundland business earlier this week.
Story here with @LukeVanceBarr: telegraph.co.uk/business/202…
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
BREAKING
The OBR suggests that successive increases in the national living wage and the employment rights act will hit jobs
It says the employment right act will have a ‘negative economic impact’ and hit businesses through ‘increased uncertainty, lost flexibility and higher Labour related costs’
It says that these will ‘more than offset’ any potential increase in productivity
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
Budget Word Count:
Benefits 37
Welfare 23
Farming 0
Farmers 0
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
Nothing highlights the fiscal failure of this government more starkly than the plight of Poundland. The chain's 600 stores and 12,000 workers sit on the verge of collapse, not because its customers have walked away - Poundland's sales grew by 6.7% in September - but because of this government's unaffordable tax rises, which makes it impossible to run a business that works on slim profit margins to keep its prices down for its customers. How ironic that a government preaching about helping the least well-off is forcing a company out of business that does just that.
Play stupid games win stupid prizes. What did they think would happen to businesses selling products at razor thin margins?
Well done @UKLabour another scalp for your incompetence.
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
Good morning @BowenPies
Your plea for some breathing room from the Chancellor didn't fall on deaf ears - the nation heard it, and the troops are coming.
I've just bought one of your Mix & Match pie boxes, and am sure others will support you too.
bowenpies.co.uk/
Ouch
🚨 BREAKING: A UK bank chief executive has said of Healey's budget:
"Taxing the engines of growth to reduce VAT on gherkins is end-of-Rome level of stupidity"
ft.com/content/80acb561-34e2…
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
'Taxing the engines of growth to reduce VAT on gherkins is end-of-Rome stupidity'
If that bank CEO had gone on the record, others would have followed suit.
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
Local piemaker explains how Burnham's first Budget will make things much worse:
"I don’t qualify for the business rates relief because I’m multi-site… I’ve got two shops, so I don’t qualify. The minimum wage has increased. I’m not saying we shouldn’t pay staff. I’m saying we can’t afford to pay them…
All my staff have been with us for years. So I’m going to have approximately a £700 a week increase. My suppliers are having an increase too. My supply bills are around £20,000 to £30,000 a week. That’ll go up 10%, so £2,000 to £3,000 a week. So that’s £4,000 a week I’ve got to find…
That’s about 20,000 to 30,000 pies a week. So my costs have gone up. I’ve got no business rates relief. The National Insurance is crippling me. The energy crisis is crippling me. I’m going to have to put my prices up,
Customers are going to get mad. I’m going to get less profit. As a family, as a director, I’ve got to take a 2% cut. So my family, my one-year-old girl. I’m taking a pay cut. The business is taking a pay cut.
How is that breathing room for me? Where’s my breathing space? John Healey, if you’re listening, where’s my breathing space? You promised me. You promised the UK breathing space. Where is it?"
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
European Commission sounds the alarm (now !!!) about the number of oil refineries closing in the region over the last 20 years. "We need to counter this trend," says EU Energy Commissioner Dan Jørgensen. "This crisis is a wake-up call." Quite.
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
BREAKING
The Treasury’s entrepreneurship adviser has announced she is quitting.
Alex Depledge tells my colleague @hannahprevett start-ups are treated as a “sideshow” and a “nice to have”.
“Entrepreneurship can’t be seen as a good news bonus on the margins of economic policy. That mentality is really dangerous for British business as a whole…”
Depledge due to leave her role on Thursday, the day after the Budget.
Read her full comments here👇
thetimes.com/article/b28ab86…
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
🚨 NEW: The Government’s entrepreneurship adviser has quit ahead of the Budget
“We treat [innovation and entrepreneurship] as a bit of a sideshow... that mentality is really dangerous for British business as a whole”
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
💡Essential Budget pre-reading for every MP and journalist from @OBR_UK while they await the EFO
📣TL;DR: age related spending is making the welfare state chronically unaffordable.
assets.publishing.service.go…
Our next Economic and fiscal outlook will be published on 28 October 2026.
It will be published on gov.uk/government/organisati… after the Chancellor has presented the Budget to Parliament.
Supporting material, supplementary documents and detailed forecast tables will be published on obr.uk/ on the afternoon of 28 October
ALT Blue background with title text reading: 'Economic and fiscal outlook'. Body text reading: 'Due 28 October 2026'. White calendar icon below. Office for Budget Responsibility logo in the bottom right corner.
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
Sigh.
Some chatter on social media would have you believe that crime is out of control.
The facts tell a different story.
As @frasernelson has shown in his Substack today:
Violence is at its lowest level since the crime survey began in 1981.
Robbery is at a record low.
Crime, excluding fraud, is 78% down on its peak in 1995.
And the stats show this Government is delivering on its promises too:
Knife crime is down 11%.
Knife murders are at their lowest level in 35 years.
Thefts including phone snatching have fallen by 20% in the last year alone.
But I know there is more that we must do, and we will:
We’ve put more than 3,800 extra neighbourhood officers into roles, with named, contactable officers for every neighbourhood.
We’re introducing the most significant reforms to policing in a generation.
We are tackling rising rates of violence against women and girls through our landmark strategy.
And we are tackling crimes like fraud, more prevalent in our increasingly online world, with £250 million directed to this challenge in our Fraud Strategy published this year.
Benjamin Davis-Rice 🇬🇧 retweeted
The Europoors are at it again.
I can't believe that this government looks at the slowest growing continent on planet earth and thinks 'yes, let's be more like them'.
Europe is a chronic disaster zone and we should largely be doing precisely the opposite of what it decrees - especially on energy and tech policy.
