Britain’s trade bodies must confront challenges of their own

What does the future hold for Britain's trade bodies? We hear a great deal about the disruption that poses huge challenges to their members but what of the disruption facing membership groups themselves? Many are struggling with declining membership rates, or the competing interests of the members who do remain.

Take the British Retail Consortium (BRC), where discontent among some retailers is now a topic of boardroom conversation. At a time when high-street institutions are fighting for their survival, the BRC has welcomed to its fold the online rivals who give its traditional members such a headache. Perhaps this is no bad thing – Amazon is as much a retailer as any struggling department store chain. But some bricks-and-mortar members are asking how their trade body can represent the interests of both the hunted and the hunter.

Particularly acute is the frustration over business rates, with high street retailers desperate for changes to the property tax.

“There is definitely a sense among retailers that the BRC is conflicted right now,” says one senior retail industry figure. “Their actions are about self-preservation – they are seeing Amazon as the future. That means they can’t campaign on business rates in any meaningful way.” Indeed, a group of heavyweight retailers have formed a new alliance to fight on this very issue.

In the summer the BRC suffered a setback when Tesco, Britain’s largest retailer, revealed plans to cancel its membership, ostensibly as a result of the grocer’s merger with Booker. But one ex-BRC senior executive tells City PM the reason "definitely won’t have been because of the Booker merger – that is a convenient story. It may be they regard BRC as ineffective, or they regard the presence of Amazon as being unsuitable.”

The BRC emphatically rejects these criticisms, but away from retail other groups face challenges of their own. The director general of the Institute of Directors has quit his £450K a year role, just months after the body's new chair said he would be held accountable for a decline in membership. In the City, finance groups find it hard to settle on a public position that reflects the interests of the multinationals as well as the smaller, domestic outfits. Brexit has exacerbated this tension.

The voice of industry and business is important – now more than ever. Lobby groups and business networks have a vital role, but efforts to assist and champion their members will be hampered if they don't face up to challenges of their own.