Gideon Amos MP reacts to Spring Statement

Gideon Amos, MP for Taunton and Wellington, has called for more support for small businesses following the Chancellor’s Spring Statement yesterday (Wednesday).

“Small businesses are the backbone of our economy,” he said. “They're the centrepiece of our high streets and our town centres and they're the biggest sector in the British economy.

“We want to see the tax on jobs – the increase in National Insurance contributions paid by employers – gone.

“We want to see business rates abolished and replaced with a better system but we didn’t get either of those things in the Spring Statement.”

Mr Amos said that, instead, the government’s new house building plans were aiming to bring in about £10 billion to help balance the budget.

“The challenge with their house building plans is they are assuming the buildings actually get built and a lot of the proposals they put forward will simply rack up the number of planning permissions issued.

“We've already got planning permission for 1.5 million homes which have not been built – including 13,000 homes in Somerset.

“If we just add more and more permissions to that, it's not necessarily going to deliver the houses.”

Mr Amos, the Liberal Democrats’ spokesperson for housing and planning, said he was also concerned about planning powers being taken away from local councillors.

“We want to keep that democracy in place so you can still contact your councillor about planning matters in your area.”

He also urged the government to adopt a “use it or lose it” approach with developers to ensure that homes with permission are actually built.

“If we're going to unlock a lot of those houses, we need the infrastructure to go with them.

“That’s why projects like the Wellington and Cullompton stations are so important as they will benefit the whole of the South West.”

Mr Amos said he welcomed the extra money for social housing announced by the government earlier this week.

“Unlock the infrastructure, build social homes and the number of houses that get built could be almost unlimited,” he added.