John Healey is a man who enjoys a greasy spoon fry-up, but only if it comes with a large dollop of HP Sauce on the side. Over bacon and eggs, the Chancellor has been known to turn his nose up at generic brown sauce and to whisk out the branded bottle, which lives permanently in his bag for condiment crises.

But as Healey mulls his Budget next month, he’s thinking not so much about what is on his plate, but more about how he can help the café owners. Central to his Budget planning is driving down the cost of doing business to boost growth, mindful of how Labour’s 2024 manifesto committed to replacing the business rates system to level the gap between online giants and high streets.

Within days of becoming Prime Minister in July, Andy Burnham announced that pubs, clubs and live music venues were set to receive a 20 per cent cut to their business rates bills, saving the typical pub an estimated £1,100 next year. Now, Healey is understood to be considering how he can extend business rates relief to other small businesses such as café owners, hairdressers and florists at his Budget next month.

Such a move would undoubtedly be popular among those who saw Burnham’s targeted focus on pubs and clubs as unfairly skewed towards one end of the hospitality industry, perhaps even an early attempt to pick winners in a sector already buckling under former chancellor Rachel Reeves’s hike in employers’ national insurance contributions.

In his first keynote economic speech last week, Healey made clear........

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