All Them Dogs by Djamel White

The first one is local to you Geoff and it's not big news yet but it was just been bubbling away I've been keeping an eye on it and it's in the it's very specific to the UK but it's about bookstores seeking tax relief and I think what's happened was when the budget was released earlier this year there were tax rises, which meant that a lot of businesses were impacted and their costs were going to go up.

And there was some anxiety around that.

And the government in response to that said, well, we do want to save the local high street, so we'll give tax relief to pubs and hospitality businesses.

And bookstores have joined this push to say, well, we'd like the same sort of tax relief because we can't absorb these extra costs.

This tax on business, property taxes, I think, is involved.

When wages go up or when taxes go up, with books, you can't just raise the price because books have that recommended retail price and bookstores tend to keep to that price.

And so they can't do anything to match it with their, you know, they can't pass that on to their customers.

There's a crisis in reading.

So it's a time where government is trying to actually get people buying books and encourage kids back into reading and And of course, the high street has been under threat from online shopping and that sort of thing.

So all of those factors have been going into this argument and I don't know where it will land.

But I did hear, I think Andy Burnham had promised that if he got into power, he would reduce the taxes on some of the shops, the pubs and hair salons.

So I just, I'm not sure if he's covering bookstores, but...

Geoff, you can be our ears and eyes on the ground... ...and keep us posted on that one.