8 July 2020
Sunak’s economic update
Rishi Sunak has announced a raft of measures to boost the economy and safeguard jobs with the announcement of the Construction Talent Retention Scheme, a £3bn green investment package including retrofitting homes and public buildings, and a boost to housing by scrapping stamp duty on homes worth £500,000 until 31 March 2021. Further measures are expected to be announced in the Autumn budget and spending review.
The Construction Talent Retention Scheme is an online portal that supports redeployment of staff at risk of redundancy across the sector, while also enabling temporary employee loans between businesses. Displaced workers will also be able to helped to find a route to new employment in construction. At IMS we consider this to be a necessary and worthwhile scheme that should help to minimise job losses in an industry that is already facing concerns over labour shortages as a result of Brexit. Whilst the green measures announced are a step in the right direction toward net-zero, there are calls for further measures to support the development of eco-homes and go further to safeguard a green recovery. It will be interesting to see what measures will be announced later this year.
