Parties’ manifestos fail to shed light on policy detail - Andrew Henderson

If next month’s General Election results in a Labour victory, this will constitute just the third change of government in the UK since 1979.

Despite the heat and noise of the political permacrisis through which we have lived now for many years, switches of government in the UK occur only occasionally. So when they do, the impact on business is invariably high.

When the keys to No.10 pass from one political party to another, businesses are presented not only with an entirely new cohort of ministers and advisers to navigate and influence, but also with a new policy agenda which may be profoundly different to that which they have become accustomed.

Andrew Henderson is Director of Public Policy at Pinsent Masons (Picture: Wullie Marr)

While organisations have been working hard to gauge what the election result may mean for their operational and strategic interests in policy terms, caution has been the watchword for detailed policy announcements. Granular policy has been in woefully short supply, as parties seek to present the “smallest moving target” for their opponents to attack.

This dynamic can prove frustrating for business, which favours not just political stability, but also clarity on the policy horizon, which is critical for investment decisions.

With the major party manifestos now published, some policy shape has begun to come into focus. We know for example on the public finances that both Labour and Conservatives are committed to cap Corporation Tax at its present level, and that a Starmer/Reeves government intends to publish a roadmap for business taxation for the next parliament and to create a new Regulatory Innovation Office.

On employment and skills, Labour plans to implement its “New Deal for Working People” in full, include the banning of zero hours contracts while, for their part, the Conservatives pledge to create 100,000 more apprenticeships every year by the end of the next parliament.

A Starmer/Reeves government intends to publish a roadmap for business taxation (Picture: Leon Neal/Getty Images)

However, manifestos are equally notable for what they do not say, as for what they do. Deliberately high level, so much so that a cynic might accuse parties of shirking from potentially awkward policy scrutiny, manifestos are really just the pencil outline of an image of government, on to which the paint of more granular policy is applied at a later date.

It is at this later date – which of course falls after all votes have been cast – that businesses will be able to ascertain whether the finished image is to their liking and, importantly, whether the artist has veered from the original sketch, or off the canvas entirely. The latter is a distinct risk when very large majorities come into play.

Organisations will look to the new government’s first King’s Speech on 17 July, which will outline policy priorities for the coming parliamentary term, and thereafter to the many formal consultations and bill publications, which should offer programmes of a sufficiently detailed nature as to assess operational impacts.

In the meantime, business leaders’ time may be well spent in familiarising themselves with the personalities of the incoming administration, to ensuring their own organisation is connected and in a position of strength from which to influence, before the policy taps are finally turned on.

Andrew Henderson is Director of Public Policy at Pinsent Masons