2018... Plenty of challenges loom for business and politics
additional cost of 18-yearolds having to make pension contributions.
This means more unremunerated work for employers, let alone the cost of their contributions. I cannot imagine that many will opt out, for they would lose the mandatory employer’s element.
At the moment this is levied at just one per cent, but rising to two per cent on April 5 2018 and three per cent a year later.
Then a major expense for all businesses and one that has not yet been properly quantified in terms of cost is the implementation of another piece of Euro legislation, namely the General Data Protection Regulation. This is going to be an expensive exercise whereby any organisation that handles personal data has to have permission from the owner of such information to retain it, and demonstrate to outside inspection that such material is properly safeguarded, with monitoring systems regularly audited.
For large organisations, this will likely require a dedicated department.
On the political front, there is bound to be an enormous amount of hot air generated over the continuing negotiations in relation to Phase 2 of Brexit.
All the signs are that they will be much tougher than Phase 1, and as the deadline for agreement or otherwise approaches, the unresolved problems of the first phase, such as the Irish Border situation, will have to be tackled once more.
This will not be solved by ambiguous forms of words, for this is the end game, and concrete arrangements have to be made.
2018 will also see the tightening
There is bound to be an enormous amount of hot air over negotiations for Phase 2 of Brexit
by Momentum over the Labour Party, taking it still further to the Left, with non-conforming councillors and MPs becoming more concerned about their own position, with de-selection a fact of political life. This will not be very comforting for career politicians with an eye to the long-term.
On the other hand, unless Theresa May, politically weak, can paper over some of the cracks in her Tory ranks, especially in relation to Brexit, there could be a very damaging split that might will lead to a change in leadership. An exciting year to look forward to! Russell Luckock is chairman of Birmingham pressings firm
AE Harris