Betrayal. That is the word you hear from the chief executives of some of the UK's biggest employers as they absorb the impact of Rachel Reeves's Budget.
Our writer Dominic Lawson argues that Labour is, deliberately, moving Britain to the less flexible employment regulations of the European model. Pictured are Sir Keir Starmer and Chancellor Rachel Reeves The poor fools had imagined that because Labour had promised not to increase national insurance, they would not increase national insurance.
Andrew Murphy told the BBC: 'We were just about to initiate the work. Unfortunately, the change in National Insurance in particular just tipped that balance so those stores will now not be opening.' His father, Malcolm, who founded the company, had long been a substantial donor to the Conservative Party: Richard Walker seemed to have a rather 18th-century view that this should give him priority in being selected to stand for Parliament.
Andrew Murphy, the chief executive of The Entertainer, Britain's biggest toy shop company, immediately scrapped plans to open two new stores