With Keir Starmer officially moved into 10 Downing Street and his cabinet appointed to support him, all eyes are now on them to deliver on the promised initiatives. With mounting pressure from all industries, what will it take for the Labour government to prove they were worthy winners of the ballot?
Over the last few years, the UK has experienced political turbulence, and now business leaders are looking to the government to make the changes needed to help business thrive. To find out more, we spoke to business leaders to see what they want the new government to prioritise and change.
Addressing the skills shortage
Top of the agenda for many businesses is the need to upskill today’s workforce. Following years of austerity cuts to state spending on adult education, and a decline in both state and private sector investment in skills, the UK is undeniably facing a skills shortage, which undermines business confidence, investment and productivity across the country. A report by the Learning and Work Institute found that the UK skills shortage will cost the country £120 billion by 2030 with a shortfall of 2.5 million highly skilled workers and an oversupply of 8.1 million people with intermediate or low skills. Both the new government and businesses must invest in learning and development to provide people with the missing skills needed to address the gap.
Nick Palmer, Solutions Engineer, Censys, recognises the importance of upskilling: “I’m a committed advocate of people. In all our fascinating and diverse forms, there is no work without people. No companies, products or consumers. Fixing the skills issue requires investment in people, and there’s absolutely no way around it. We need organisations that can execute well-devised resource planning strategies carefully targeted at reselling and upskilling existing staff. Organisations need to start thinking in the medium-term for training and development budgets. Over those timeframes, retention, satisfaction, productivity, loyalty and delivery all improve. Correctly executed, absenteeism and healthcare-related costs drop. We all know this, but so few companies actually do it.”
Keeping security tight
Following an increase in both the volume and sophistication of cyberattacks, cybersecurity is another huge topic of conversation, with businesses needing better guidance from the government to implement effective measures against such threats. Upon his appointment as Science, Innovation and Technology Secretary, Peter Kyle acknowledged that national resilience suffered ‘catastrophically’ under the Tories. The secretary warned Britain is ‘desperately exposed’ to cyberthreats and little has been done to address the rising cybersecurity risks. Cyberattacks are incredibly detrimental to businesses and cost the UK economy billions of pounds each year.
As such, the UK government has announced a desperately needed new Cyber Security and Resilience Bill as part of its legislative package. The Cyber Security and Resilience Bill aims to address existing vulnerabilities and strengthen the UK’s defences against cyberthreats by expanding the scope of the current cyber regulations, empowering regulators and increasing reporting requirements.
This is a step in the right direction, however, more needs to be done. Darren Thomson, Field CTO EMEAI at Commvault, advocates for more collaboration between governments and the private sector: “If governments are going to improve their ability to address cybersecurity issues, there needs to be a much greater emphasis on collaboration and information sharing
“Improving information sharing between government organisations and the business community is key. Effective threat intelligence, for instance, fundamentally depends on proactive collaboration so all stakeholders can act on emerging security risks with the same level of insight. The private sector already has an established and highly specialised threat intelligence community that could be more effectively integrated into public sector cyberdefence strategies.
Laurie Mercer, Security Architect at HackerOne, agrees, stating: “Tech companies should expect a multi-faceted and collaborative approach from the UK government to address and combat cybersecurity threats. Central to the government’s approach is the fostering of public-private partnerships that underscore the essential role of tech companies in national cyberdefence strategies. This collaboration should not only include the sharing of knowledge and resources between organisations but take a whole of society approach: involving the expertise of ethical hackers and external industry specialists to bolster cybersecurity measures.”
Modernisation of outdated systems
It is not just cybersecurity, but also financial security that is a concern to businesses. Following the reports of a 22 billion hole in public finances, it’s not a far reach to expect tax rises in the not-so-distant future. But, tax hikes may not need to be so extreme if the government invested time and resources into establishing a seamless tax process. The UK has an incredibly complicated tax system and ensuring accurate tax reporting and payment to HMRC can be a challenging process. Embracing technology to streamline tax reporting and payment will be hugely beneficial for those paying tax in the UK.
Bruce Martin, CEO of Tax Systems, said: “Businesses need the government to push forward with further modernisation improvements to the way businesses report finances and taxes. Initiatives like those recently mentioned in the minister’s July statement to invest and improve HMRC’s compliance work with increased personnel and investment in technology will go a long way, but they are not enough. Since the introduction of Making Tax Digital (MTD) for VAT in 2019-20, no further progress has been made in the digitalisation of the tax system, which is frustrating after businesses put in significant effort to set the foundations for big change. There is no denying that modernisation and technology investment is the only long-term solution.
“While we are seeing businesses take the initiative to further drive their digitised tax initiatives forward regardless of HMRC regulation, businesses need the support of the government to improve reporting accuracy and efficiency. Now is not the time to stagnate. Now is the time to push forward and realise the full potential of the digitalisation of tax.”
Opportunity, innovation and investment
Innovation is imperative for economic growth, but government strategies currently fall short of the standard needed to deliver the level of innovation necessary to drive the country forward. Increased investment in research and development will help create innovative products and services that will benefit the UK economically and socially. For the benefits of increased R&D and innovation the government needs to take action towards increasing and investing.
Most recently, the government has shelved plans to invest 1.3 billion into tech and AI plans. This includes £800 million for the creation of an exascale supercomputer at Edinburgh University and a further £500 million for AI Research Resource, which funds computing power for AI. This decision has been widely criticised, with many expressing fears this will push entrepreneurs to other countries and the UK will lose out on industries essential to the future.
Nick Palmer, Solutions Engineer, Censys, said: “Global politics is turbulent and troubled at present. I wonder whether progressive, forward-looking leadership focused on improving human outcomes would ever get involved in some of the petty bun-fights and populism that passes for politics right now.”
He concluded: “One thing is clear though: focusing on investment, opportunity, innovation and a willing embrace of technology is critical for world leaders.”