Small Business Support: Covid-19 — House of Commons, 2021-01-13
Topic: Macroeconomics
Olukemi Olufunto Badenoch (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He asks a really good question. The Government recognise that businesses within the hospitality supply chain have been disrupted by the recent necessary restrictions to hospitality businesses since the start of the pandemic. The Government have acted to deliver support to those businesses and ease cash flow problems for them through business support schemes, but businesses that have not been eligible for grants may be able to benefit from the additional restrictions grants. We recently increased the funding available under that scheme to £1.6 billion across England, and I know that similar schemes will be happening across the various devolved Administrations. It is up to each local authority to determine eligibility for the scheme, based on its assessment of local economic need. However, we encourage local authorities to support businesses that have been impacted by covid-19 restrictions, but which are ineligible for those other grant schemes. So there will be support—that is the point that I want to make to the hon. Gentleman On the support that we have provided to small business owners, I believe that I said that we had provided 1.4 million SMEs with more than £68 billion of loans. We have also included a temporary reduction in the VAT rate and the business rates holiday, both of which will run until 31 March. Financially distressed businesses and individuals have also been able to benefit from more flexible deadlines through the Time to Pay scheme. Furthermore, we are providing extra help through our welfare system for those who need it most, as well as other support such as payments for those asked to self-isolate. Quite simply, this is a support package that is unprecedented in its scale, and we know that it is working. In fact, the International Monetary Fund describes our economic plan as one of the best examples of co-ordinated action globally and successful in holding down unemployment and business failures The hon. Member for Edinburgh West made a very good point about how private sector businesses have been able to adapt and we should be able to follow suit, and we are doing that. We have not stopped there with the things that we have done. We have faced the evolving nature of the crisis. We have redoubled our efforts to protect businesses, jobs and incomes in response to the huge challenge presented by the virus. As the situation changes, we assess and we adapt. As a result, we have extended the CJRS until April. We are supporting self-employed people with a fourth income grant, which, combined with the up to £14,070 of individual support from the first and second grants, places our scheme among the most generous for self-employed workers in the world Furthermore, last week we issued £4.6 billion of additional support that will protect jobs and benefit 600,000 businesses around the UK. Under this change, business premises in England that are required to close, including those in the retail, hospitality and leisure sectors, can now claim a one-off grant of up to £9,000, and that is on top of existing support of up to £3,000 a month. We have also made available £500 million in discretionary funding for local authorities in England to support local businesses in their areas—money that is in addition to the £1.1 billion we had earlier provided on this front. As I said to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), this extraordinary package of economic help extends to every region and nation of the United Kingdom. As hon. Members will recall, in December we further increased our up-front guarantee of funding for the devolved Administrations this year from £14 billion to over £16 billion. At every stage of this crisis, we have strived to help as many people and businesses as we can, and as rapidly as possible We acknowledge that we have not been able to support everyone in the way that they would want. However, individuals who find that they are ineligible for one support scheme may still be able to claim from one of the many other sources I mentioned earlier The Government are immensely grateful for the contribution of small business owners and their workers in every part of the UK throughout the crisis. As I hope I have illustrated, the Government have sought to protect and support this vital sector at every turn, and we will continue with this approach until the battle against coronavirus is won Question put and agreed to.