Thursday, December 13, 2007

A Pro-Business Government

Many governments, including the UK's, claim to be pro-business. Pre-Blair I doubt a Labour government would have claimed this but the Tories have always been there. What many people never realize is that pro-business can mean different things to different people.

Usually when a politician talks about business he is referring to the big boys, not to the lady who owns the corner shop come post office. Small to medium sized business does not have the same needs as the giant global companies but government policy is seldom framed for their benefit. The big boys are the ones writing the cheques.

As a boy I worked for a GEC company. GEC back then made almost all its money from government contracts which were guaranteed not to lose money. In fact Harold Wilson supplied the funds for GEC to gobble up many other electrical and electronic companies. By the 70s it was sitting on a mountain of cash which it certainly wasn't re-investing into UK industry. Lord Weinstock had very little in common with the small businessman.

If you are supporting a political party for being pro-business it might be best to find out what sort of business it is pro;-)

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