On Tuesday, 7 April, Karl McCartney JP attended a debate at The Bentley Hotel in South Hykeham organised by the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) where he and other panellists, including three other Prospective Parliamentary Candidates for the City of Lincoln Constituency, took questions from the FSB’s members.
Karl McCartney JP said: “I would like to thank everyone at the FSB for inviting me to this event and, in particular, the Regional Secretary, David Dexter, for his Chairmanship of the debate. All the panellists seemed to agree that small businesses are the lifeblood of the economy in this constituency and responsible for nearly half the job creation in the UK.
“I was grateful for the opportunity to discuss how the Conservative-led Government has thrown its weight behind them and introduced a whole host of measures over the last five years to make it easier for businesses to be created and thrive. A cut in corporation tax, further help with business rates and the landmark Employment Allowance, which is cutting up to £2,000 off their National Insurance bills, have all led to the creation of 760,000 more businesses since 2010, and over 300 000 of them are small businesses.
“I support the efforts to help more small employers hire an apprentice and make it cheaper for small businesses to employ young people. From this month Employer’s National Insurance Contributions (NICs) for those under-21 have been abolished altogether and from April 2016 they will not have to pay NICs for apprentices aged under 25. This will make it much easier for businesses to give a young person their first job and open-up more opportunities for our school leavers.
“Red tape has been cut drastically and thousands of pointless regulations are also being ripped out. The net burden of regulation has fallen by £2.2 billion since 2011 and the Government is on track to be the first in modern history to leave office with fewer regulations than when it arrived.
“But, as the FSB members made clear, there’s much more to do. Accessing finance remains an issue for many but improvements are being made through expanding the Business Bank and extending the Funding for Lending Scheme, making it cheaper for banks to lend. Locally small businesses are in tune with my efforts to improve the transport infrastructure in and around Lincoln, not just for them, but also their colleagues, employees, clients and customers, helping their businesses grow and attracting new business to the City and surrounding areas.”
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For further information, please contact Karl McCartney JP at admin@karlmccartney.co.uk.