Fears for high tech future in UK

Veritas, one of the world's leading software firms, has explained to UKTECH why it has fears for the future of Britain's high technology sector if the Government continues to tax rather than encourage its development and if a significant part of the skilled workforce moves overseas.

Last week Veritas announced that it was investing £250 million in a new headquarters in Reading which would create 2,000 new jobs. However, this is significantly less than was originally anticipated and the company has made it clear that the current taxation climate in the UK could deter further investment.

In an interview with UKTECH, Chris Boorman, the European marketing director of Veritas, said: "We are a big US software company and we want to expand further and further. We have decided to open our European headquarters in Reading and we have committed to creating 2,000 new jobs over five years and £250m will be spent on new headquarters.

"What we are saying to the Government is that they are doing some good things but they are not being as positive as they should be to the high technology sector. For example, they are introducing taxation schemes on share options for employees which will have a negative impact. We have a choice where we put our head quarters in Europe and if it's too expensive to do it in the UK because of taxation, why should we choose the UK?

"On the question of share options, it's an unlimited liability - as we, as a company, want the employees to share in our success, therefore if the share price soars, the tax is unlimited.

"Personally, as a British person working for Veritas I am very keen that Britain is seen as the leader in Europe in high tech development. I'm proud that we have also opened up an engineering facilitiy in the UK where we want the best of Britain's skilled workforce to develop the best British products.

"We want to stop any brain drain out of Britain as we want to attract high technology, highly skilled people to work for us. However we as a society and we as the UK must not force these skilled people to go outside the country because of taxation system here.

"The Government should be putting a lot of emphasis and focus in keeping people here and encouraging growth in high tech and facilitating the UK's high tech sector by encouraging both contractors and businesses."

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Susie Hughes