Small firms disappointed with UK budget[fr][de] 

UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling placed the emphasis firmly on job creation, devoting £2 billion to helping unemployed people under 25 years of age. He also increased tax on earnings greater than £150,000 to 50%, announced a £1 billion boost for the housing market and increased taxes on fuel, beer and cigarettes. 

His prediction that the economy would shrink by 3.5% sent the value of the British pound tumbling , although he expressed optimism that recovery would begin this year. 

However, the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) complained that the budget had ignored the plight of SMEs. Offering a cautious welcome to the Chancellor's focus on employment, the FSB said more must be done to tackle late payments by private companies and called for firms who fail to pay on time to be "named and shamed". 

The budget comes as the European Commission begins to implement the Small Business Act, including the updated Late Payments Directive, which encourages public bodies to settle their bills within 30 days (EurActiv 9/4/09). 

In addition, UK SMEs want an independent corporate mediator installed, to facilitate dialogue between banks and small businesses in order to stimulate the flow of credit to companies. It is estimated that a quarter of UK business failures are due to late payments. 

John Wright, the FSB's national chairman, said job creation measures for young people are to be welcomed, but he expressed disappointment that nothing had been done to support firms struggling to hold on to their employees. 

"A government-funded wage subsidy for short-time working would have been a real help, but was totally ignored," he said. 

The budget also came under fire from opposition political parties in the UK, who claimed the Chancellor's predictions of a return to growth by the end of 2009 were "fantasy". 

Conservative MP Philip Hammond said the Chancellor had not been honest with the public about the scale of the problems in the economy, while Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg said the government's failure to get its predictions right would lead people to believe they were living in a "fantasy world". 

Just hours after the budget was announced, the International Monetary Fund published a more pessimistic forecast for the year, saying the UK economy would shrink by 4.1% this year and by 0.4% next year. 

Mr Darling defended his projections, saying they were broadly in line with external expectations, but noted there was currently a plethora of economic forecasts offering varying predictions of when the recovery will begin.