Keir Starmer must scrap this 1 bill - and now field is open for PM to strike

The world of British business and commerce is suffering at the hands of this Labour government in a way that many thought impossible. In the run up to last year's general election, Labour spent a great deal of time courting the business community with Rachel Reeves going out of her way to reassure leaders that her party was fully behind UK PLC. Then came her Budget last October which was a proper kick in the guts to anyone who runs a business and employs people. Raising the minimum wage and increasing the amount employers pay in National Insurance contributions left businesses wondering how they could continue. Add to this a rejig of business rates that sees most enterprises paying more and the picture was grim.

Whilst the Chancellor was doing everything possible to make running a business even harder, Deputy Prime Minister and Housing Minister Angela Rayner had collaborated with her friends in the unions to create the Employment Rights Bill. This legislation is currently making its way through Parliament and has been widely condemned by business leaders as something that will not only add even more costs to their operations at a time when they are already hard pressed but will also increase bureaucracy.

Now Ms Rayner has returned to the back benches after not understanding how Stamp Duty works - despite having been Housing Secretary as well as Deputy Prime Minister - there is an excellent opportunity for the Prime Minister to dump this deeply flawed piece of legislation.

The Conservatives are doing a decent job of highlighting how damaging the Employment Rights Bill will be. Alison Griffiths, MP for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton, has spoken in Parliament on numerous occasions about how the new legislation will be particularly damaging to seasonal and hospitality businesses that she has in her constituency, many of which rely on tourism given their coastal locations.

She says the new legislation restricts an employer's ability to hire when demand is greatest and recruit less when roles are not needed. Additionally, she highlights that this will also affect those who favour flexible work - like our students and pensioners - as well as the businesses.

Away from politics, business groups have said how damaging the new legislation will be. The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) acknowledged that, whilst it is a manifesto commitment by Labour, they had not fully considered the consequences of the new proposed laws. They correctly point out that if the Government is to achieve its aim of getting hundreds of thousands of people off benefits and into work, it will be businesses that will need to employ these people.

When focusing on employing those who are inexperienced and therefore potentially more likely to make claims against a company in the first few months of employment, those companies will simply reduce the number of people with this lack of experience that they employ. Why would any business take the risk in hiring someone who might not be quite up to the job if getting rid of them becomes a legal nightmare? Particularly for small businesses, it would be a risk too far.

Lord Stuart Rose, the former chief of Marks & Spencer and Asda, has long been sounding the alarm bells over Labour's anti-business measures saying, "we should all be worried about the state of Britain". He has called for "radical action" to create jobs and restart growth.

In commenting on the Employment Rights Bill, he said the legislation would make it harder for firms to hire. In a radio interview, he asked: "We've had a very flexible labour force. Why make it harder now?"

Union spokespeople were fast out of the traps following Ms Rayner's resignation with the Trades Union Congress urging the government to "stay on course" in delivering the legislation.

But the Prime Minister needs to find the backbone to take on the unions over this. Our economy is stagnant and even those with the most basic understanding of economics knows that growth comes from the private sector, not the public sector. That means allowing businesses the flexibility of employing people in a way that works best for them, instead of making it even more complex and prohibitively risky and expensive.

There is an opportunity here for Sir Keir Starmer to properly show British businesses he supports them especially now that ministerial supporters of the Employment Rights Bill have resigned or have been shuffled elsewhere.

Scrapping the Bill is exactly the boost that every business needs in these tough times. To continue with it in its current form will see business owners shut up shop for good.