Overview
- Reform UK set out a five‑point plan cutting VAT for hospitality to 10%, reducing beer duty by 10%, exempting the sector from the recent employers’ National Insurance rise, phasing out business rates for pubs by 2029/30, and loosening tied‑pub rules.
- The party says the programme would be paid for by reinstating the two‑child cap on benefits, a move critics warn would push hundreds of thousands of children into poverty and which analysts say may not cover the plan’s cost.
- Reform’s own figures put the costs at roughly £1.9bn for the VAT cut, £400m for lower beer duty, £100m for the NI exemption, and £580m by 2029/30 to taper business rates to zero for pubs.
- Nigel Farage faced accusations of a policy U‑turn after previously backing the lifting of the two‑child cap before now proposing to bring it back to fund hospitality tax cuts.
- Industry groups said the government’s separate 15% business‑rates relief for pubs is welcome but insufficient, as some publicans backed Reform’s focus on rates, VAT and staffing costs while others questioned the trade‑off.