Caravan Insurance

Small businesses in the UK are continuing to face significant challenges as they prepare for the chancellor's Budget statement.

Gordon Brown's announcement tomorrow could see increases in some of the costs that small firms face, but there could also be some help dealing with regulations.

Small businesses claim that they are suffering because of red tape and high fuel costs.

Running a fleet of vehicles is expensive at a time when the government is looking to reduce the impact of emissions.

Van insurance, new regulations for lorry drivers, vehicle excise duty, oil prices and increases in the minimum wage are all issues of concern for business owners.

Many van drivers themselves will own or work for small firms meaning anything in tomorrow's Budget affecting vehicle running costs will be of great interest.

John Walker national policy chairman at the Federation of Small Business (FSB) said the government needed to free up small firms to enable them to grow.

"Regulation, both its volume and complexity, crime and a poorly skilled workforce are issues that we have raised many times before," he said. "It is therefore worrying that they are still the main barriers to growth for small firms. It demonstrates that the action taken so far has been inadequate."

Small firms contribute to more than 50 per cent of the UK's GDP and employ over half of the private sector workforce.