Calls for business rates pub relief to extend to all hospitality

By Hamish Graham

Published: 12 January, 2026

Last week’s reports that pubs will see great business rates support has been followed by a chorus of industry figures urging the government to extend the relief to all of hospitality.

Speaking to radio station LBC, CEO of trade body UK Hospitality (UKH) Allen Simpson commented: “My initial thought is if it’s pubs only, that’s not going to touch the sides of the problem.

“Pubs are feeling very badly affected – it would be a 76% increase for the average pub, but restaurants have been impacted too, and hotels most of all. Hotels’ bills are going to go up 115%. So, for this to be a solution it needs to solve it for the whole of hospitality.”

Read more: Business rates – Hospitality venues to be hit with £32k hike

The details of the anticipated package of changes have yet to be announced. The climbdown comes just six weeks after November’s budget which set out changes which, according to UKH, would see hospitality venues incur an average cumulative £32k business rates increase from now until the end of the 2028/29 period, as reported by Harpers. The average business rates paid in 2028/29 (£40,409) would be 94% higher than their present figure of £20,835.

Over the same period, the series of uplifts to business rates for pubs will see them pay 76% more in 2028/29 (£16,300 on average) compared to the present average of £9,300.

As detailed by Simpson hotels are the comparatively worse affected by the November policy changes, with the 115% hike over the three-year period set out due to incur an average increase of £205,200.

Kate Nicholls, chair of UKH believes the government has the means to provide immediate relief to hospitality.

She added: “We need a hospitality-wide solution, which is why the government should implement the maximum possible 20p discount to the multiplier for all hospitality properties.”

Although the November budget saw a lower multiplier introduced for retail, hospitality and leisure (RHL) businesses with a rateable value (RV) of less than £500k, substantial increases to RVs mean that venues will still see large hikes.

In recently released research, UKH also detailed how it anticipates 2,076 closures next year if the proposed business rates increases are introduced. Broken down by subsector, this could mean closures for 963 restaurants, 574 hotels and 540 pubs.

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