Has Boris Johnson put his first foot wrong?
While the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, has been at the centre of many political stories and many political controversies in the past, he has until now led a fairly charmed life as the Mayor of London. Problems have come and gone, excuses have been made and released and ultimately the power of Boris Johnson and his team has amazingly remained very resilient. However, he is now taking on the capital's business arena and they are set to fight him all the way. So what is going on?
Boris Johnson has announced plans to increase business rates across the capital from April 2010 as he looks to raise more than £4 billion to fund the Crossrail scheme. The expectation is that he will impose the maximum increase allowed on business rates, which is two pence in the pound, at a time when UK businesses are struggling to survive and many are actually set to go to the wall.
This move has attracted a warning from the British Retail Consortium that there will be "considerable opposition" to the move if he goes ahead with plans at this stage of the economic cycle. Others will no doubt follow suit and Boris Johnson could for the first time in his tenure as Lord Mayor of London find himself in the middle of a battle. He will do very well to sweet talk his way out of this one!
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