// BRC calls for government to review business taxes, including business rates
// In a statement to the Treasury select committee, the BRC calls for taxes such as payroll tax to be analysed
The British Retail Consortium (BRC) has called for the government to analyse the UK’s business tax system in a statement to the Treasury select committee today.
The statement it urged the government to independently review business taxation, such as payroll taxes, VAT, corporation tax, business rates and taxes not yet used in the UK.
The BRC said that the current business rates are “strangling the high streets” by leading to the increased number of store closures.
The property tax has risen 45 per cent from 38.4p in the £1 to 50.4p since the business rates regime started in 1990.
“Retail is in the midst of a transformation, as new technologies and changing consumer behaviour impact the way we shop,” BRC chief executive Helen Dickinson said.
“The investment needed for this re-invention is being held back by a rising tide of public policy costs, and business rates is the biggest among these.
“Retail accounts for five per cent of the economy, yet pays 10 per cent of all business taxes and a staggering 25 per cent of business rates,” she said.
“If the committee can seize the opportunity to find a way to address the madness of a system which is strangling our high streets, they can protect shops and jobs and put British retail on the right trajectory for the future.”
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