UK small businesses demand a second referendum for Brexit

More than 50% of small businesses in the UK want to hold a 2^nd referendum as to if the proposed deal on Brexit should be accepted once the European Union negotiations have finished, a new analysis by Citibase has found.

The stalled Brexit talks, amid continued banter from all involved parties has fuelled a lack of confidence and uncertainty in the UK business community, a recent survey by Citibase, the office rental provider has shown. It also highlights that a large proportion of business owners are more than happy to leave the EU without a deal being struck.

More than 1000 UK small and medium business decision makers were surveyed with nearly 75% stating that they demanded office leases on a short term basis, of less than three years, due in part to the current Brexit issues. Since Citibases last survey in early 2017 there has been a marked increase from just over 50% of the surveys participants saying they would prefer 3 year office leases of less. This clearly outlines a lack of confidence in the current Brexit situation by the SME business community.

Newcastle and the north east, plus Scotland, have seen a large rise in short term leases during the past 12 months with the North Easts business owners voting at 90% wanting shorter term leases and Scotland not far behind with a vote of 80% of business owners saying the much preferred business leases of sub 3 years.

The Citibase study also shows that almost a quarter of all small/medium business owners believed that Brexit was having a detrimental effect on their revenue. This figure has grown by nearly 10% through the quarters of 2017 and to echo this sentiment, nearly 35% of SME’s have made preparations for a bad impact on their revenues once Brexit finally concludes. In the same survey, sentiment was also strong that SME owners had lost faith in the current governments competence to secure a good Brexit deal and only 32% of those surveyed , had trust in the negotiating ability of the government which is a reduction of over 10% since the middle quarter of 2017.