“What can I do for you? Tell me what you want,” the chancellor asked the diners. He took questions at each table – not making a quick escape, as Boris Johnson had done earlier when he spoke briefly at a business lunch without inviting questions.
Sunak acknowledged the concern over business rates, but politely invited his questioners to tell him how else he could raise £30bn a year. When they suggested a property revaluation, he said that would be opposed by 50 per cent of businesses. “He is a class act. He really engaged and was completely on top of the detail,” one company boss told me, not needing to make the contrast with Johnson. “Rishi is very good at the personal stuff – even better than Blair.”
Although guests left the dinner reassured, Johnson was to spoil the party by repeatedly blaming business’s addiction to cheap foreign labour for recent shortages in shops and petrol stations. The prime minister’s solution – telling companies to raise wages to attract more British workers – was clever politics, but at the end of the week, some senior Tories are jittery about his rift with business.
This story is from the October 09, 2021 edition of The Independent.
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This story is from the October 09, 2021 edition of The Independent.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
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