The British Takeaway Campaign, an umbrella group representing those involved in the supply and preparation of the nation’s favourite foods, today (Tuesday) reiterated its call for a fundamental overhaul of the business rates system and called on councils to stop sitting on much-needed rates relief.

Responding to inflation data for September, which will set the level of business rates next year, Chair of the British Takeaway Campaign, Ibrahim Dogus, said:

"Business rates are one of the biggest burdens on takeaway businesses and a further increase will deliver a hammer blow at a time when they are already grappling with rising food and wage costs.

"With a third of takeaways already saying they will be negatively hit by the last business rates review and many firms yet to receive the rates relief they are due, this latest increase could have a serious impact on the sector’s ability to continue to grow and create jobs.

"That’s why we’re calling for the Government to overhaul the business rates regime to make it fairer and more transparent. That includes more frequent revaluations.As a first step, it should ensure that local councils stop hoarding business rates relief funds and that these are released as a priority.”

Earlier this year, the British Takeaway Campaign released independent research, which revealed the takeaway sector supports 231,000 jobs and takeaways themselves directly contributed £4.5bn in gross value added(GVA) contributions to UK GDP in 2016, rising to £9.4 billion whenfactoring inthe multiplier effectof supply-chain and employee spending – equivalent to 0.5% of GDP.