The Scottish Chambers of Commerce have urged the government to use next week’s Holyrood budget to incentivise businesses, investment and job creation to break the cycle of low growth.

Business leaders have also called on Holyrood ministers to prioritise non-domestic rates relief and avoid additional income tax burdens.

They have set out three key priorities for the Scottish government ahead of Tuesday’s budget:

• Non-Domestic Rates: Replicate the 75% discount on business rates for retail, hospitality, leisure firms for RHL businesses in Scotland as recently extended by the UK Government for RHL firms in England & Wales.
• Income Tax: Rule out any further divergence from the rest of the UK on income tax bands.
• Regulation: No anti-business regulatory policies to be introduced for the remainder of this Parliamentary term.

Joanne Davidson, Director of Policy at Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, said:

“The Scottish Government’s budget is always keenly watched by the business community, but this one will be even more keenly scrutinised than usual. Scotland’s economy needs genuine support from our Government to encourage the essential growth and investment that we need to create the wealth and funding to bring positive change.

“Edinburgh Chamber has been arguing for some time that our policy-makers must, at the very least, do no harm by adding even more regulation or red tape that adversely impacts on business – either on its own or cumulatively. That means no more policy introductions that might be seen as anti-business. The New Deal for Business introduced by the First Minister when he took office needs to start demonstrating that there is a new approach to growing our economy.

“A clear demonstration of this would be matching the 75% discount on business rates for retail, hospitality, leisure firms for RHL businesses in Scotland as recently extended by the UK Government for retail and hospitality businesses south of the border. The funding has been made available to do so and this would show genuine support for a sector which has suffered more than any other since the pandemic, and which supports tens of thousands of jobs in this city.”