Retail bosses are to warn UK Chancellor Healey that a tax raid on shops will push up prices and worsen the cost of living crisis, according to Telegraph

Pre-budget lobbying of this kind is a standard feature of the UK fiscal calendar: industry groups amplify warnings through sympathetic press in the weeks before a statement, and the Telegraph has historically served as the conduit for business-facing pressure on Treasury policy. The substance here is a pass-through argument, that higher levies on retail premises or employers feed into shelf prices rather than being absorbed in margin, and past episodes of employer cost increases have tended to produce a mix of both, with the split depending on sector pricing power and competitive intensity. The read for rates and sterling is indirect: what matters is whether the Chancellor signals accommodation or proceeds regardless, since the choice shapes the near-term inflation path the Bank of England conditions on and the gilt issuance backdrop. The worth-watching follow-ons are whether the Treasury briefs a counter-narrative, whether the OBR scoring treats such a measure as inflationary in year one, and whether other sector lobbies pile in, which has historically been the tell that a revenue-raising budget is being prepared. As unattributed advance reporting rather than a decision, the signal is directional on intent, not on policy.