Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether she has had discussions with Cabinet colleagues on the potential merits of introducing a phased reduction in employer National Insurance contributions for businesses with fewer than 50 employees.

The Government has taken a number of difficult but necessary decisions on tax, welfare, and spending to fix the public finances, fund public services, and restore economic stability after the situation we inherited from the previous administration.

One of the toughest decisions we took was to raise the rate of employer National Insurance contributions (NICs) from 13.8% to 15%, whilst reducing the per-employee threshold at which employers start to pay National Insurance (the Secondary Threshold) from £9,100 to £5,000.

The Government decided to protect the smallest businesses from these changes by increasing the Employment Allowance from £5,000 to £10,500. This means that next year, 865,000 employers will pay no NICs at all, and more than half of all employers will either gain or will see no change. It means employers will be able to employ up to four full-time workers on the National Living Wage without paying a penny of employer NICs.