Labour’s little helper: the CBI is failing British business

What is the Confederation of British Industry for? Indeed, who is it for? The soi-disant voice of British business held its conference this week. As one might expect, the organisation’s chief executive, Rain Newton-Smith, lamented the tax increases levied on employers in the Budget.

She issued a plea to the Chancellor for the CBI to be more closely involved in the design of fiscal events in the future. She was joined by the organisation’s chair in chiding Labour for treating the private sector as a cash cow. But these criticisms were pianissimo compared with the chorus of praise the group has been orchestrating for Labour.

The CBI welcomed the Labour manifesto during the general election for its mission to deliver sustainable growth. The organisation praised the Chancellor for her speech at the Labour party conference, which ‘hit all the right notes’. Even this week, alongside the gentle regret she expressed at tax increases, the CBI’s chief executive praised the Prime Minister and Chancellor for their ‘strength and determination’, thanked Rachel Reeves for her ‘brave decision’ to change the government’s fiscal rules and lauded Labour for putting the country in ‘a strong position by drawing the curtain on a near-decade of instability at home’.

If the CBI truly believes that such treacly public support helps shield the private sector from the most anti-business government for four decades, one must question not just its judgment but its whole raison d’être. There is worse to come for business in the months ahead in the form of the government’s Employment Rights Bill, which threatens to re-arm trade unions at the same time as making it more difficult to fire underperforming staff. Perhaps the CBI fondly imagined that a Starmer administration would be a rerun of the Blair government.