By Danny Williams, managing director, Pioneer Trading

Like every other business owner, I have taken the last few weeks since the Autumn Budget to let it sink in.

But my initial reaction, is that this was not just bad for business but also, bad for employees – ‘workers’ according to the Labour party – as well. Their belief that the two are separate is of course naïve at best, but a cynical, convenient act of self-deception is most likely.

Having made the commitment that they will not increase costs to workers in their election manifesto, the play on words is now revealed for the lie that it was.

There can only be two outcomes for business because of this budget and that is UK jobs being exported overseas and further investment in automated processes, both in commerce and of course, manufacturing, to satisfy the objective of dumping jobs, and therefore the additional costs.

And whilst I accept that the quest for automation is already in full swing to alleviate the continuing issue of recruiting decent people with a good work ethic let alone skills, the additional costs of employing human beings, now more than justifies further investment in manufacturing and other automated processes.

The most obvious high-profile example of outsourcing has been call centres to which, subjectively at least, there has been a negative response often due to language difficulties of course. But other areas are thriving and will, I truly believe, now grow, especially since the broad acceptance of home-working.

What difference does it make if the employee is in Eastern Europe, India, Carshalton or Aylesbury if they are well trained and articulate. Now there are significant cost savings to be made with the additional cost of employing Brits, many more companies will be considering outsourcing.

And the Christmas party will be cheaper too.

History repeating itself…

History dictates that a Labour government spends money and especially in and on the public sector. Which means I will be sharpening my pencil on special retail deals for our friends in the local councils, NHS, education and key amongst private and public sector workers, train drivers of course, as they clamour to spend the extra spondoolicks they will enjoy in their back pockets over the coming months.

Sadly however, the much hoped for post-election stability that we all hoped for has not happened, with the new government failing to inspire any sort of belief that they know what the hell they are doing or indeed, where they intend to take us.

Whatever colour your politics may be, the 14-year rule of the Conservatives inevitably ground to a halt and never truer was the old cliché that opposition parties don’t win elections, governments lose them.

That priceless yet mysterious element ‘confidence’ remains aloof from our homeowners and as my reader will know by the time they read this, the much-anticipated pre-Christmas boom has had the resonance of a particularly damp squib, consistent with the rest of 2024.

So how will 2025 fare? Despite my earlier comments I believe that home improvements will remain (at best) level, although I am hoping for a busy time in our much-valued work with NHS estates, especially with more than £20 billion more in funding promised in the Autumn Budget.

The government’s commitment to provide £500million of new funding to deliver 5,000 affordable social homes is, I fear, just pie in the sky. Although there are specialists, there is a good reason why a shortage of social housing continues to exist: nobody wants to build them because there is no money in it.

I will watch with interest to see how they propose to translate this solid commitment into reality, outside of the legal requirement for private developments. The shortage of social housing will be compounded by the increasing pressures on private landlords for whom there is even less incentive to own and rent out properties.

In short, I see trouble ahead and fear that this will feel like a very long five years.