FSB: Speaking up for small businesses
As businesses continue to face a raft of financial pressures and challenges, and new labelling laws coming into effect in a matter of weeks, Head of FSB NI, Roger Pollen outlines the importance of empowering small and medium-sized businesses.
We are all well aware of the ongoing financial strain on businesses, particularly following the rise in National Insurance Contributions and increases in the various forms of minimum wage. These have caused a sudden impact on businesses following their announcement last October.
Parallel to this are proposals for legislation at Stormont, of which many retailers may not be aware, but which will also have significant impacts on their business. As Roger Pollen, Head of the Federation of Small Businesses in Northern Ireland explained, it is important for smaller businesses to be informed of what may be coming down the line.
“There are proposals to introduce legislation that could impact on businesses very badly, and I am not convinced there is a lot of awareness amongst businesses of what is coming down the track,” said Roger.
“The most far-reaching and significant is the ‘good jobs/employment rights bill’, which proposes to reform about 17 areas of employment law at once. A number of the proposals are playing catch-up with GB as the Executive was down for half of the past decade, and the pandemic also slowed the legislative process down.
“Some of the proposals will impact seasonal workers and holiday pay calculations, and while some of the changes are sensible updates to law, others are major incursions into private businesses that could cause great damage.
“Trade unions could access businesses with as few as 10 employees, even without having members in those businesses, and they are also seeking collective bargaining powers. Many of these are family businesses and most businesses are not even aware that this is now on the horizon.”
Roger said that one of the reasons for low awareness is because the consultation was carried out during last summer and, additionally, some businesses may not get exercised by proposals until they actually become law.
“Our role is to be upstream of these changes and to do something about the threat they pose, through intensive political engagement,” said Roger.
FSB NI is both a representative and an advisory body, established in 1974. With 6,000 members in Northern Ireland and 150,000 across the UK, they are a big player in offering some essential services. With 24-hour, seven days a week legal helplines, tax helplines and offering fully professional and indemnified services, FSB NI has been able to build up these services as a result of having so many members who have so many similar needs.
“We provide a huge raft of pre-lawyered documents which are all available from the website, so a business owner can have their own tailored policies in place on employment, data handling, health and safety, cyber and much more,” said Roger.
“We have been able to build that up because we have so many members that have so many needs. We have many small and medium retailers because there is nobody else that provides what we do in terms of that advice and indemnities 24/7.”
READ THE FULL INTERVIEW WITH ROGER POLLEN IN THE MAY ISSUE OF NEIGHBOURHOOD RETAILER HERE
