Britain's Night Economy Is Worth £110bn. It Has No Policy.

Andy Burnham has spoken up for Britain's nightlife. The argument now is that he needs to think considerably bigger.

The government cut business rates for pubs, clubs and music venues by 20%, part of a wider attempt to revive high streets and protect institutions contributing to the social as well as economic life of communities. It is a welcome recognition of a sector under real pressure. It could also be the start of something far broader.

The number that reframes the debate

Around £110bn of economic activity takes place in Britain's night-time economy each year. More than eight million jobs involve working at night, and as much as 27% of the UK workforce may be working night shifts of some kind.

Those people are not mainly bar staff. The night workforce includes nurses, carers and emergency workers; freight and logistics staff; cleaners, security guards and manufacturing workers; airport and transport crews; and the people maintaining the digital infrastructure an increasingly 24-hour society depends on.

The night is a labour market at least as much as it is a leisure economy — and almost the entire national conversation has been about the leisure part.

The government cut business rates for pubs and clubs by 20%, but hospitality is a minority of the eight million jobs worked at night. Photograph: Xavier Lorenzo

What a real policy would cover

The question is whether an intervention aimed at nightlife businesses can grow into a serious national night-time policy — and whether the job warrants a dedicated minister.

Transport is the clearest example. Late-night buses and trains are almost always discussed in terms of getting revellers home safely. They are also how a nurse reaches an early shift, how a cleaner gets home at 2am, and how an airport worker arrives before the first departure. Framing night transport as a safety measure for drinkers means it gets funded, cut and timetabled as though the other passengers do not exist.

Planning needs the same shift. Housing, logistics, entertainment, hospitals and transport infrastructure frequently occupy the same urban space while operating on entirely different clocks. Better night-time planning could anticipate those conflicts rather than leaving licensing authorities to arbitrate them after the fact, usually between a venue and its new neighbours.

The employment dimension

A night-time policy would also have to be a workforce policy. Living wage discussions rarely engage with the specific costs of shift work: the health effects of circadian disruption, the childcare that is unavailable at those hours, the transport that is not running, the premium paid for none of it.

These are not marginal concerns affecting a small group. They apply to something approaching a quarter of everyone in work.

Why it keeps being overlooked

The night economy is under-governed for a structural reason: it is invisible to the people who write policy, who are asleep while it happens.

It also cuts across every departmental boundary — health, transport, business, housing, culture, policing — which means it belongs to no one. A rates cut for pubs is the version of night-time policy that fits inside an existing department's remit.

A genuine one would need someone whose job is to look at the eight million people working while the country is dark, and ask what the state currently offers them. On the present evidence, the answer is a discount on a pint they are not there to drink.