The Spring Funds – doubtless the final main fiscal occasion earlier than a Normal Election – will provide automotive retailers the possibility to foyer the Treasury on what it sees as their priorities.

“This supplies an important alternative for the Authorities to take heed to the considerations of automotive retailers and description its imaginative and prescient for the way forward for the sector,” mentioned Sue Robinson, chief govt of the Nationwide Franchised Sellers Affiliation (NFDA) which represents automotive and business retailers.

The NFDA has now submitted its funds proposal to the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, forward of the 24 January submission deadline, as he prepares his Spring Funds, scheduled for six March.

The submission coated an array of areas affecting the automotive trade. Three key components from NFDA’s submission are:

• prioritising funding and development within the UK automotive sector.
• addressing the abilities shortages that the trade is presently dealing with together with reforming the apprenticeship levy.
• incentivising shoppers and growing client confidence throughout the transition to electrical by worth incentives and bettering electrical charging infrastructure.

Robinson mentioned: “NFDA’s funds proposal has conveyed varied points that are presently affecting the automotive retail sector and the broader automotive trade together with points which had been lately flagged by dealerships in our 2024 outlook survey.

“Because the automotive sector continues to navigate its manner by more and more difficult instances, the Authorities wants to make sure that facilitating funding within the financial system and the automotive retail sector are a high precedence. Likewise, the automotive sector has invested closely throughout the transition to electrical.

“NFDA urges HM Treasury to assist the automotive sector’s efforts to reaching the Authorities’s net-zero targets which the UK might want to unlock a long time of development in cleaner street transport.”