A new year brings a chance to reflect on what has been achieved, and gives us all the chance to look forward and set our goals and aspirations for the year ahead.

Looking back, I can definitively say that 2015 was a very productive year for the Federation of Small Businesses.

We had some strong wins during the autumn statement and spending review, such as the confirmation of small business rates relief.

This equates to £439 million saved for 602,000 smaller firms.

There was significant spend announced for infrastructure; our pressure on local and national MPs has meant money specifically allocated towards solving Operation Stack.

Focus on Growth Hubs was certainly positive news for all SMEs and we welcome the launch of the Kent and Medway Growth Hub set up to support and advise SMEs in our county.

December’s Small Business Saturday campaign was a great success. In all, 75% of councils took part, up from 50% in 2014. On the day itself, a reported £623 million was spent with small businesses, a massive increase on the previous year’s total of £119 million.

The Chancellor has now called for the UK to become “a higher wage, lower tax, and lower welfare society”.

This may be a catchy sound bite but it’s increasingly clear that businesses are expected to step up and play a key part in delivering it.

This year will see the introduction of new policies like the national living wage, the small business rollout of the workplace pension, changes to dividend taxation, and the introduction of the apprenticeship levy.

Each of these changes will bring their own challenges and require all businesses to adapt – but they also present opportunities.

For FSB, our immediate priorities are pushing for affordable and available flood insurance for businesses.

We will be lobbying on mandatory quarterly tax returns and looking closely at the pubs reforms.

A long term lobbying project has been the fundamental reform of business rates – this will remain in our sights as we continue our work supporting small businesses throughout 2016.