Reaction to Tory recruitment subsidy

CBI: "“We know small and medium-sized manufacturers are cutting jobs for the first time during this crisis. While firms have to do what is right for their businesses in these challenging times, these imaginative proposals would help some small businesses keep people in work.”

British Chambers of Commerce: "With unemployment continuing to rise sharply, companies are not in a position to think about recruiting new staff right now. Businesses are shedding staff. Cashflow is of primary concern to businesses at the moment. This policy announcement would have been a valid welfare to work initiative in better times, but it is not a survival tool for small businesses during a severe downturn.”

The Federation of Small Businesses warns - according to Paul Waugh - "that the plan could act as "disincentive" to firms hiring those unemployed for less than three months."  [This - and the scheme's complexity - is among the most important objections].

Janet Daley: "What this proposal will sound like to most voters is a tax break for business. However sound it may be as an incentive to companies to take on employees (assuming that they have the wherewithal to do so), it does not speak to the ordinary hard-working, over-taxed family which all parties are seeking to placate."]

Fraser Nelson: "It’s a welcome move in the right direction: cut taxes on companies, and you will get more jobs. But 350,000 of them during a deep recession? Dream on."

Daniel Finkelstein: "A brilliant stroke of genius from George Osborne."*

* Okay, we made that one up.

Comments

[Libertarian]

Oh dear, not much enthusiasm there. Where's Malcolm Dunn to say that Boy George's plan is wonderful.

BTW, I love the dig at Fink Tank! SDP Fink tinks that it's 1980!

[GB£.com (33% of Tories disagree)]

Is '35' some kind of magic digit combo in the roons book of fabricated stats?

First we had 3.5 billion to be raised from non-doms (giggle). Now we have 350,000 jobs created (chortle).

This tiny tax credit only applies to companies who have not laid off any staff to date, and employees who have been unemployed for more than 3 months.

Even in true roon optimism, you've got to wonder if they have multiplied their numbers by 100 to achieve something headline worthly.

[H Taylor]

Better to say nothing than come up with this half-baked notion. It does smack of Tories looking after their own - ie. business - I'm afraid.

[Louise]

It's a good policy but far too little, far too late. The fanfare over the last few days made me expect something comprehensive and consumer-orientated, not something as derisory as this. NI needs to be slashed wholesale or incorporated into personal taxation - but it is just typical of the Tories at the moment that they build up to a big announcement and then when it arrives you think...Is that it?

Cameron has to get his skates on otherwise he is going to go down to Brown fairly soon.

[DCMX]

H Taylor is right. Where are the tax cuts for the low-paid? So much for compassionate conservatism.

[Tim Montgomerie]

There are valid criticisms of the policy DCMX - I'm certainly unconvinced by it and the tax cut is much less than I'd hoped for - but you talk about the "low-paid". Noone is lower paid than the unemployed and this plan is aimed at them.

[Felicity Mountjoy]

"Recruitment subsidy"?

Isn't that a bit loaded?

I suggest "Recruitment incentive".

[David (One of many)]

I share some of the frustration that these cuts are not more profound and 'sexy', if such a word can be used. But I find the CBI comments encouraging because the most vulnerable businesses at times like this are the smaller ones. The ones who have to lay off one or two of their workers, but where said workers are essentialy half their workforce. The idea that this will keep more small businesses afloat while hopefully open up some more employment opportunities for people who may have already been laid off is certainly pleasing.

[Libertarian]

I feel sorry for the low paid Mr Noone. It seems that NO ONE is immune from the American destruction of our spelling and grammar.

[Tim Montgomerie]

Sorry Libertarian :-(

[Tony Makara]

The policy initiative is taking some unfair criticism. I believe its a positive move and helps the very people who create jobs, business.

The scheme will be more successful if backed up by job-matching through jobcentreplus. People should be offered a newly created position, and expected to take it.

The initiative is certainly a lot better than Labour's failed New Deal system in which the only people to find work are the £350 work-experience providors.

Well done to the party leadership for coming up with this initiative.

[Mike Thomas]

I don't think the nature of the tax break or the numbers involved are that important.

What is important is it has the media and commentariat pitching that in the blue corner you have funded proposals without additional borrowing. In the red corner, you have unfunded tax cuts requiring more borrowing and more taxes later.

I'd wager, the public don't want more borrowing and more taxes.

Seeing Labour having to come out and argue for unfunded tax cuts when Brown was vehement in opposition when Lamont was doing just that in 1992 will dent their economic credibility.

Borrowing for tax cuts only means more interest to pay and higher marginal tax increases later.

People felt taxed enough even when the good times were here last year, IHT anyone?

[Libertarian]

What happened to Osborne's plaedge for simpler taxes? This is yet another complication.

The main beneficiaries of this will be firms who pay low wages and have a high turnover of a staff (often migrants). So its good news for fast food vendors and pubs. The Guildford Tory Food Police will not be pleased!!

[KRP]

Not enough. Not nearly enough. Few companies will qualify, even fewer would be able to claim without help from accountants.

I was expecting more and looking at the responses from others I am not alone.

Wasted opportunity. Can't see this appealing to a single voter.

[NigelC]

Perhaps The Conservatives could learn something from Vodafone. Their strategy, which is based on delivering more value to customers (eliminating non value added activity and cost) seems to have been widely applauded today.

[David (One of many)]

I just thought of something - what happens when you add the cuts from this, the IHT proposals, the council tax freeze, the business (or corperation, I can't remember which) tax cut, the stamp duty abolition and various other things together? Thinking about this on its own - it's sensible, practical, and funded, if not big and sexy - but add it together with the other stuff and there's a good package there for everyone. Compare this with borrowing to fund taxes and I think the distinction becomes clearer.

[True Tory]

I think its a weak policy. Why can't Cameron have some backbone? I think he thinks as long as he says a few little things, announces a few policies which tinker at the edges he'll win because Brown will lose. Wrong. He's undestimating Brown again. He never learns.

I don't like Brown at all but he seems to have more of a grip of things. Cameron seems lost.

[Vincent Wall]

If I've been out of work for four weeks and apply for a job against someone who has been out of work for 14 weeks I don't stand much of a chance do I?

[Rose]

Why are we not pledging to cut income tax for the lowest paid and for struggling middle income families? Let's not leave all the good policy decisions to the Lib Dems!

[Bill]

I'll happily admit that I have been against the Cameroon Project from the start. It was not and remains not the answer to our country's problems. Now the country is suffering pay back for New Labour's misrule and the Tories give the impression of not having a clue. Whilst it may seem paradoxical that Labour appear to be benefitting from dire economic times, why should the Tories benefit when they positioned themselves on fluffy issues of little concern to the man in the street. Chocolate oranges and the environment, what a laugh. And "sharing the proceeds of growth"! Hilarious. If the Tories had focussed on where the economy was going wrong, Labour might not be bouncing back. I have no real faith in Cameron's Tories whether in opposition or in government.

[Alfred T Mahan]

As a business owner, I give this about one out of ten.

Surely it's better to try to prevent redundancies in the first place, rather than deal with the fallout? This does nothing for businesses struggling to keep their existing staff.

When hiring new staff, a £2,500 short-term incentive is of marginal benefit to say the least. You have to think long term - is the job going to be viable in a year or two? You cannot afford to take on staff on a wing and a prayer, because employment legislation means it's well nigh impossible to get rid of even poor performers. If this is designed merely to create short term jobs, it's a pretty hopeless response to the financial crisis.

It's exactly the kind of micro-management tinkering that gets perverse results, breeds bureaucracy, and is ultimately pointless.

Come on - say it like it is! We're overtaxed, government spending is too high, and there are too many bossy bureaucrats. Or don't you believe that any more? I'm beginning to wonder. Never mind that we're in a recession - you have to tackle government spending.

[David_at_Home]

Does the Tory Leadership have a death wish or does it just seem that way?

This scheme is too complicated, inherently unfair to recently laid off workers and probably too complicated for most honest SMEs to bother with. On the other hand, it might be rather good news for some unscrupulous employer using cheap immigrant labour.

What is to stop a vegetable packing company firing their current workface of Poles this week (e.g. they all suddenly found they would have to return to Poland for family reasons) and recruiting a new group of Lithuanians next week, thus avoiding the NI he would otherwise pay?

Cameron and Osborne just don't live in the same world as the rest of us.

Please, please, my Tory activist friends, for the sake of our nation, find some new leaders.

[GB£.com (33% of Tories disagree)]

What happens to the really small companies, like newsagents etc, who only employ 1 or 2 people? Just one new person would constitute more than 20% of their total workforce which is the limit imposed by these proposals.

Will they get a reduced pro-rata taxed credit or will they be completely excluded?

These seem to be the very companies for whom 2.5k would make a significant difference so I hope Cameron is not excluding them by design.

May we have some clarification on this?

[Iain]

"I don't like Brown at all but he seems to have more of a grip of things. "

Not if his press conference is anything to go by for Brown argued both for funded and unfunded tax cuts, and against funded and unfunded tax proposals.

Of course it would need a Shadow Treasury team to be on the ball to show up and ridicule Brown's confused position.

[Martin Cole]

I believe I can soon stop offering constructive criticism on these pages, all we need is D.C. in front of the press and cameras followed by G.O. on The Politics Show with A.N. straight after and these two buffoons are sure to soon self-destruct.

Truly lamentable policy and positioning!

[michael.mcgough]

David_at_Home ;I agree this will just encourage migrant churn with the taxpayer picking up further costs for the displaced

[Mr Angry]

This is a nonsense policy that will do nothing for most people, very little for a very few, and completely fails to help businesses that are suffering from the economic slowdown.

If Osborne can't do better than this then the country, never mind the party, is in big trouble.

[pp]

Sorry if some people don't like it but something like 20% of the population are directly employed by the state, and have a clear self interest in protecting their jobs. Another significant proportion of the population are directly dependant on (or have a strong interest in) these people being secure in their jobs - they will not see themselves served by public sector cuts, unless there is a viable private sector for them to move to.

On the other side of the argument there are people like me, who run small businesses, who resent these people being maintained more confortabley than I am, at my expense!

And if the government dared to offer me 'help' I would further resent the fact that they took money from me in the fist place to be able to offer it back as 'help'!

Given this polarisation, the tories would have an impossible job it they only got support from one end of the spectrum...

[pp]

Sorry if some people don't like it but something like 20% of the working population are directly employed by the state, and have a clear self interest in protecting their jobs. Another significant proportion of the population are directly dependant on (or have a strong interest in) these people being secure in their jobs - they will not see themselves served by public sector cuts, unless there is a viable private sector for them to move to.

On the other side of the argument there are people like me, who run small businesses, who resent these people being maintained more confortabley than I am, at my expense!

And if the government dared to offer me 'help' I would further resent the fact that they took money from me in the fist place to be able to offer it back as 'help'!

Given this polarisation, the tories would have an impossible job it they only got support from one end of the spectrum...

[NigelJ]

As a professional recruitment consultant and MD of a small recruitment company I have to say that to me this appears a sound policy. As for BCC and FSB, I can only conclude their spokesmen know very little about recruitment, or are motivated by Labour sympathies.I have certainly never had a great regard for either organisation or the quality of their representatives (apologies to the few that are good!) It is not a groundbreaking policy, but is sensible and it will work. I wish it were in place now!

[The Bishop Swine]

As far as it goes it a pretty good policy. It should help to get people out of the dole cues before it becomes a lifetimes habit and it rewards good employers. However a little like the threat of reduced benefits for unemployed persons who fail to take up employment, it will only affect a small number of people. Lets not be too hard on David or George over this one, as it is well meaning and welcomed. The trouble is that it remains tinkering and little more. We will need either thousands of such initiatives if we are going to sort out our messed up welfare state. The economy is in need of radical even revolutionary thinking if we are going to build something like a fair and individual friendly society. I can see the leaderships problem, we cannot deliver real change overnight without a state of emergency mentality, thankfully although the world faces massive problems we do have the real luxury of comparative peace, so we should be thankful of that on this day of all days. I do blive thatwe need measures aimed at helping those returning to work after sickness, and I think it may be important to offer a larger bribe to business to take some of the people who have been unemployed for a long time. David said that the cost of an unemployed person is £8,000 p.a. Well maybe in some case’s but there is no point under playing the amounts in question. £8,000 includes housing but of one person only. A family of 2 adults and two children, costs the State at least £20,000 p.a. when the lost taxes are taken into account much more. So it may be possible to account a larger sum to employers prepared to give half decent jobs to the key breadwinner in these families. Now if the Government was offering £10,000 – £15,000 in some cases to employ hard to place, but valuable people. The state would win a far bigger benefit and this would of course be repaid in resumed Taxation, and national insurance contributions as well as productivity . As it is we are going to need bold policies. Many who have been unemployed for a long time, need a leap of faith, followed by some intensive retraining to find their feet again. When viewed in this light a couple of thousand will not go far.

[David Sergeant]

I suspect Cameron is making the same age old mistake that Tory leaders have made since whenever. For a year Cameron and Osborne have made assorted policy statements, they may not be enough but they exist. While comments are made about lack of Tory policies they should be repeating them, instead they think they need to come out with more policies. Not necessarily, e.g. commenting on the HBOS takeover Cameron merely says it is up to the shareholders when what he should say is something like "Although the bank rescue scheme was good in principle, Brown's dithering meant it had to be implemented in a panic and with Labour, always muddled about what goes on in the City, there are many doubts and the Lloyds/HBOS takeover, like much of the plan, should be reviewed transparently." (I think this is reasonably true but if not that is still no reason to not say it.) By not attacking Brown they are letting him assume the mantle of competence when plainly he isn't.

The Conservative party really has to get its head round the idea that to get voter support you don't have to keep coming out with new policies. It is what you say which is important. And by the way the same goes for a lot of the postings on this site.

[The Bishop Swine]

The policy statement was quite well delivered. However George had yet another bad day. I know David likes him and he has got qualities which are plain to anyone who can read people, but he simple doesn’t come across with the authority needed in a chancellor.
The policy itself is OK but we need something far bolder to get some of the long-term unemployed back into the workforce. I would like to see a sliding scale of benefits to the employers of the long term unemployed. So a person who have been unemployed for 3 months would be worth £3,000 however somebody who has been unemployed for 10 years would bring a far larger benefit to the employer. This would allow some of the very talented but clearly out of touch unemployed to be taken into full time and well paid employment. These monies would make it possible for an employer to re-train those who could benefit and would help mediate the relatively slow return to full productivity of a person unemployed for a seemingly long time. The other benefit of such a scheme would be the knock on effect of fair policies on the mood of the public.

[The Bishop Swine]

The policy statement was quite well delivered. However George had yet another bad day. I know David likes him and he has got qualities which are plain to anyone who can read people, but he simple doesn’t come across with the authority needed in a chancellor.
The policy itself is OK but we need something far bolder to get some of the long-term unemployed back into the workforce. I would like to see a sliding scale of benefits to the employers of the long term unemployed. So a person who have been unemployed for 3 months would be worth £3,000 however somebody who has been unemployed for 10 years would bring a far larger benefit to the employer. This would allow some of the very talented but clearly out of touch unemployed to be taken into full time and well paid employment. These monies would make it possible for an employer to re-train those who could benefit and would help mediate the relatively slow return to full productivity of a person unemployed for a seemingly long time. The other benefit of such a scheme would be the knock on effect of fair policies on the mood of the public.

[Louise]

@David Sergeant - you are spot on, a good analysis of the situation. It is making sure we have the public's attention on us while not giving too much away. Partly the Tories are wasting time, which upsets me given that Michael Howard should take a lot of the credit for positioning the party to be able to win this time and doesn't currently get that acknowledgement.

Secondly, the party needs a more coherent and consistent message if Brown is going to slowly claw back not just his own vote but the switch voters. My problem is that Cameron and Osborne have never impressed me as leadership who want to do more to win power than just play for time and strut about like peacocks, and even if Brown caused this recession people still on the whole are turning to him to fix it.

I'm not sure what the strategy from now on in towards the election is but Cameron and Osborne strike me as just not listening to the bad news and focussing - or getting Louise Bagshawe to focus - on the latest 14% poll when it it was a blip on a downward trend. They don't have much time to ramp up to a steady election campaign from here.

I didn't like the constant prattle last time about "Labour are all talk and no action" - it was one of the mistakes we made, we sounded too robotic - but at least we had something behind that spin and at least we had that spin. All we appear to have right now are "business breakfasts with Dave and George" and an absentee Shadow Cabinet preaching to the converted on this site.

It is going to be too late after Christmas to start putting out a coherent message, but we should at least try.

[A Cllr]

Louise

With respect you never have anything positive to say. You jump on a poll from the Times but when a poll has a better lead for us you dismiss it.

I frankly don't know why you bother even being a Conservative. I have never seen you once commend the leadership.

You seem to hark back to old days but I have to point out that under the right wing agenda we lost three elections in a row.

[anon - just had to write]

"I frankly don't know why you bother even being a Conservative. I have never seen you once commend the leadership." A Cllr on Louise

Ouch! Louise is hardly mailicious in her representations - misguided perhaps, but not malicious

[Louise]

@a Cllr - "never once heard you commend the leadership"?

Why bother - there is very rarely anything to commend. I was excited about this policy but I know a lot about what goes on in Cameron's head so I wasn't surprised when it turned out to be a damp squib.