Rachel Reeves urged to make ‘bold choices’ at Mansion House speech as growth stalls
Financial services are looking to Rachel Reeves’ Mansion House speech and the launch of her new growth strategy for the sector as a pivotal turning point.
The industry has been courted by the Chancellor in hopes of feeding ideas into the Treasury’s inaugural Financial Services Growth and Competitiveness Strategy.
Now, firms look to be banking Reeves delivering when she releases the strategy on July 15.
Over 80 per cent of leaders said they are confident the government’s plans will boost growth across the sector and attract foreign investment, according to research from KPMG.
Karim Haji, global and UK head of financial services at KPMG, said: “This week, the industry will want to see a strategy that sets out bold ambition with clear priorities to unlock this growth”.
Growth figures wane
The hopes from financial services leaders comes after the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) poured cold water on the Chancellor’s growth agenda.
The ONS revealed the economy shrank for the second month in a row, after reducing 0.1 per cent in May and 0.3 per cent in April.
The Treasury is hoping to use the financial services industry to steer growth ambitions with key reforms hoping to boost sentiment.
Olly Cheng, financial planning director at Rathbones, said: “Amid the doom and gloom surrounding the UK economy, mounting pressures on the public purse, and policy reversals on winter fuel payments and welfare reform, the Chancellor’s Mansion House speech presents an opportunity to flip the script – from crisis to confidence.”
Cheng said Reeves had the opportunity to make “bold choices with capital markets at the heart to get the economy firing” and create “game-changing measures”.
But Reeves is already speculated to have put a critical reform on ice, with changes to cash ISAs set to be paused, according to the Financial Times.
The Treasury had eyed reforms to cash ISAs as a key lever that could be pulled to drive consumers into stocks and shares ISAs and pile more liquidity into markets.