10 December 2012
Julie White, the managing director of diamond drilling, concrete sawing and demolition specialist D-Drill, said she hoped the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement would get ‘Britain building’.
In his statement, George Osborne announced £5bn worth of infrastructure spending including £1bn to be spent on upgrading and building new schools.
White said SMEs would also welcome the higher threshold for capital investment in plant and machinery, a reduction in corporation tax and business rate relief.
But White, who appeared live on BBC TV’s pre and post statement coverage (view here), believes the Chancellor has missed a trick by not providing more encouragement to firms to recruit apprentices.
White said: “We all know what a tough time construction has had. We have grown. Not because there is more work out there – we’ve had to diversify and add new divisions to continue our growth because the market is flat.
”We want to see construction growing again and I do hope that this statement – with its promise of £5bn infrastructure spending – will get Britain building again.
“That money has to be channelled towards so-called shovel-ready projects because we need to get the industry working now or I fear we will lose more skilled people and we will never get them back.
“We need more houses, new roads, rail links and schools and I hope that this can be the catalyst for it.
“As an SME, there were positives to come out of the statement – especially when you think that the Chancellor is sticking to his austerity plan with very little room for manoeuvre.
“I like the idea of encouraging businesses to invest in plant and machinery as that can help growth and I am also very much in favour of encouraging enterprise through lower tax rates.
“I am also very pleased about the fact that fuel is not going up by 3p because that affects almost every business and every consumer.
“As I said before, we need to do everything we can to keep hold of our skilled workers and also to encourage more people into our industry.
“I am a big believer in apprentices and I would have liked to have seen the Government give an NI holiday to employers for each apprentice they take on.”
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