Britain’s leading small business group has appealed to economic watchdogs to heed Sir Keir Starmer’s executive order to remove regulatory barriers to growth with a new list of reform demands.
Sky News has obtained a letter from the FSB to more than half a dozen regulators, including Ofgem and the Financial Conduct Authority, in which it calls on ministers and public bodies “to double down on growth in the alongside business and industry.
“We completely agree (with the Prime Minister) that regulators have a duty to carefully review current activities in their field to determine their impact on economic growth – to be ‘pro-growth’ and ‘pro-investment’ in their partnerships. “, says the letter.
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The FSB’s intervention emerged in the same week as a dozen watchdogs are expected to submit ideas aimed at removing barriers to growth in their responses to Downing Street.
In its letter, the FSB said the FCA should “appropriately investigate the widespread use of personal guarantees for limited companies”, which it said deters company directors from taking on debt to invest in their businesses.
He called on Ofgem to give SMEs a 14-day cooling-off period on their energy contracts, and urged Ofwat to commit to treating small businesses that have been subject to fluctuating price increases like consumers rather than big businesses.
The FSB also wants Ofcom, the communications regulator, to “expand its remit to include the regulation of cloud services alongside broadband providers, as an increasingly vital part of the national infrastructure” .
Meanwhile, the FSB urged the Competition and Markets Authority to explain in its response to Sir Keir how its approach to the new competition regime in digital markets would protect SMEs.
He added that the Information Commissioner’s Office should introduce a small business exemption or discount on its regulatory fees to level the playing field with its larger peers.
The FSB also wrote to the Financial Reporting Council, the auditing regulator, which was not among the recipients of Sir Keir’s letter, asking it to “ensure that large companies adopt the new position government against late payments by supporting much greater transparency and accountability through the performance and payment practices of large companies being added to the responsibilities of the audit committee.
Sir Keir’s Christmas letter to watchdogs – revealed by Sky News days later – was said to have been the brainchild of Varun Chandra, the Prime Minister’s special adviser on business and investment.
He is understood to have referred to the need for every government department and regulator to support growth, and called on each beneficiary to submit five ideas to fulfill this mandate by January 16.