Plaid Cymru is promising to cut business rates for small businesses – and require larger ones to pay more.
At the party’s Spring conference in Llandudno, economy spokesperson Luke Fletcher will say that how businesses are taxed needs to change if Welsh town centres are to thrive.
The party plans to cut rates for “domestic small businesses”, offsetting the cost by increasing rates for large multinationals.
Labour cut Covid-era discounts on business rates for retailers, pubs and restaurants last year, leading to claims it left some businesses “on the edge“.
The business rates plan is part of Plaid’s pitch for the next Senedd election in May 2026.
Fletcher will say: “Our high streets provide a lens on the challenges facing Welsh businesses – challenges that Labour in Wales has failed to address or made actively worse over a quarter of a century in power.
“An independent store owner on the high street in Aberystwyth pays nearly ten times more than a major chain on the town’s outskirts, and significantly more than an equivalent business in England would.
“In Bridgend, a locally-owned and managed coffee shop and bakery pays the same level of non-domestic rates as its multinational competitors.”
Business rates are paid by small and larger companies to contribute to local services. The funds are pooled into a central pot before they are given to councils.
Under Plaid Cymru plans, smaller businesses would be a “preferential multiplier” – a specific amount by which rates are worked out from the rateable value of a property.
A briefing from the party suggested this multiplier could be half of the value of what is currently paid.
The party said this would be offset by increasing the multiplier for large multinationals.
Plaid gave a case study of a coffee store in Bridgend, which it said could see their rates cut from £1,537 to £768.50.
The economy spokesman said he will launch Plaid’s economic plan “in the coming weeks”.
He will tell conference: “Our plan will see capital built, retained and recycling in our communities, instead of it leaking – and in some cases flooding – out of Wales.
“It will grow and sustain Welsh-owned businesses, delivering good jobs, reviving our town centres, and boosting living standards.”
