FDF response to the Spring Budget

Food and Drink Federation CEO, Karen Betts said:

“It’s great to see the Chancellor’s acknowledgement of the impact of inflation on households with his cut to National Insurance. In parallel, the food and drink manufacturing sector continues to keep prices as low as possible, conscious that many families’ budgets are now close to breaking point.

“But the costs of recent turbulence to our sector are real, and are illustrated in stark terms by a steep fall in investment in food and drink manufacturing, which declined by a third last year compared to 2019. Our country needs a strong food and drink sector – which underpins our food security, as well as hundreds of thousands of jobs and forward-looking science and innovation. For this we need joined-up, constructive government policies to shore up our strength and to create the conditions for investment. This was in short supply in this Budget. Instead, our sector is still held back by a muddle of poor regulation – the latest example of which is ‘Not for EU’ labelling, which will have a chilling effect on investment and exports while tying UK food labelling once again to EU rules.”