The tax on consumption is a good one really - much better than an equivalent increase in income tax or NI. Putting it on VAT means that tourists and non domiciles, as well as casual workers/people getting paid cash in hand are also contributing towards the economy on some level.
The problem for a lot of businesses (especially retail) is that the prices are shown inclusive of VAT - they have the option of keeping prices the same (absorbing the increase cost themselves), having "weird" prices (pass the cost directly on to the consumer), or increasing by round amounts (increase prices by more than the VAT increase).