2026 Budget. The Big Surprise That Nobody Should Be Surprised By 

Published 28.11.2025

Let’s be honest. Nothing in this Budget was shocking. If anything, it confirmed what most of us already knew months ago. But judging by the BBC, LinkedIn and any other Uk news source this week, you’d think someone set fire to the industry again. One gloomy article after another. Endless hand-wringing.  

Wait and see? You have got to be joking.

We have been waiting and seeing for six months. If your entire strategy hinged on Rachel Reeves stepping out of a black cab with a magic hospitality pair of tongs, then we need to talk. If you have not been forecasting, adjusting, tightening, and preparing long before this week, then you are already behind the eight ball. No sugar-coating that.

And before anyone starts pointing fingers solely at Westminster, let’s remember something awkward. We all took the Covid money. Furlough. CBILS. Bounce-back Loans, Eat Out to Help Out, VAT cuts, Rate Relief. We happily accepted the lifeline. The "bill" was always going to come back. This is not a shock. It is cause and effect. 

And Brexit? We stayed in bed that morning. We did not show up. We did not vote in enough numbers. An industry powered by people then acted stunned when it suddenly did not have enough people. Sometimes the mirror is the fairest judge.

SO HERE WE ARE

Rates relief is coming in 2026, but…

 - Labour costs are rising.

 - VAT is glued to 20 percent.

 - And hospitality is still treated like a transitional industry. One closes, another opens, the world keeps turning.

But here is the truth. The operators who survive will not be the ones moaning on social media. They will be the ones who already started making moves before the rest of us even finished the sentence “let’s see what the Budget says.” 

 - They are already running the new rateable values for 2026.

 - They are locking in the savings and ring-fencing the cash.

 - They are treating labour as investment, not expense.

 - They are cutting COGS properly with systems, not vibes.

 - They are using the future rates drop to upgrade tech now, not later.

 - They are behaving like leaders, not spectators.

SO HERE IS YOUR CALL TO ACTION.

 - Stop waiting.

 - Stop moaning.

 - Stop telling your team to push through hard days if you will not do the same for your own business.

You want to lead? Start acting like it.

Hospitality has never rewarded the reactive operator.

It rewards the ones who move, prepare, and execute while everyone else is arguing in the comments section.

 And as for waiting for the universe to step in. I have asked before. Lovely place. But if it ever ran a restaurant, the chef would quit before the first booking and the universe would comp the whole night and call it “brand building.”