Gary Neville hits out at Labour over taxes despite earlier support
The former Manchester United and England footballer, who interviewed Starmer for Labour's election broadcast last year, said the government had been wrong to make it harder for businesses to employ staff.
Neville said the economy was 'not settling' and added that Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, should have held off on the contentious £25 billion increase in employer national insurance.
The former right-back was one of Labour's most vocal supporters and before the election was a big backer of Starmer personally, having previously appeared at the party's conference to urge people to 'get behind' their leader, whom he described as a 'serious politician'.
He has a range of business interests in property, hotels and football and has joined other senior executives and entrepreneurs in their criticism of Reeves' decision to raise the cost of employment.
'I honestly don't believe that companies and small businesses should be deterred from employing people. So, I think the national insurance rise was one that I feel probably could have been held back, particularly in terms of the way in which the economy was,' he told Sky News.
'It's been a tough economy now for a good few years, and I did think that once there was a change of government, and once there was some stability, that we would get something settling,' he said. 'But it's not settling locally in our country, but it is not settling actually, to be fair, in many places in the world either.'
Neville was more supportive of an increase in the minimum wage, which rose 6.7 per cent in April to £12.21 an hour, saying: 'I don't think we can ever criticise the government for increasing the minimum wage. I honestly believe that people should be paid more so I don't think that's something that you can be critical of. I do think that the national insurance rise, though, was a challenge.'
Neville revealed in 2022 that he had joined Labour, saying at the time that the party 'has to come towards the centre'.
At last year's election, Starmer filmed a half-hour interview with Neville walking in the Lake District, which became a key element of the party's campaign. Starmer said he would be 'ready to deliver from the get-go' and acknowledged: 'Tax levels now are the highest for 70 years, so we can't just go and pull the tax lever.'
Neville warned him that 'the country are just desperately disappointed, just generally, in politicians'.
Speaking on Wednesday, Neville said conditions were 'really tough' for UK businesses that were finding their margins squeezed by rising costs.
'It's tough. It's really, really tough because cost of products has gone up, cost of everything, utilities, rents, everything, has gone up,' Neville said. 'It is challenging at this moment in time — there are certain sectors where it's tough to operate, just purely because of rising costs and people finding it tough to be able to find the money to go and support those local businesses.'
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