Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises: Funding
Debate between Lord Popat and Lord Barnett
Lord Popat
My Lords, the Government’s own research shows that awareness of the access to finance schemes has fallen in recent years. This is why we are launching a tailored marketing communication campaign to increase the awareness of many government access to finance schemes available to small and medium-sized businesses. This activity usually results in a highly successful brand. The launching of the business bank next year will solve part of that problem.
Lord Barnett
My Lords, has the Minister seen the recent survey by BDRC, which showed that only 23% of SME companies knew anything at all about the Government’s initiative? The survey also found that of SMEs applying for the first time, only 50% were accepted. Does he have some new initiative that might help?
Lord Popat
My Lords, my answer is no different from that to the previous question about awareness. Yes, we are doing everything possible through the Bank of England and the clearing banks to make their customers aware of the different schemes available to SMEs to borrow money through government incentives.
UK Industry: Competitiveness
Debate between Lord Popat and Lord Barnett
Lord Popat
My Lords, the value of the pound is determined by the international market. The fall in exports is mainly due to the current economic crisis, not just in the UK but in Europe as a whole. Half our exports are to the European Union and there are real issues in the European Union. The currency changes that take place quite often have a limited impact due to the very high import content in our exports. Hence any depreciation or the value of the pound going down will not have real impact on our exports.
Lord Barnett
My Lords, as competitiveness is not going to be helped in any way by the Chancellor changing his fiscal policy, despite the strongest advice from people he depended on until recently, such as the IMF, can we take it that he will now be totally dependent for improving anything at all on help from the new Governor of the Bank of England through increasing monetary policy, even though it may hurt current inflation?
Lord Popat
My Lords, the Chancellor has the right policies in place to reignite our economy, growth and competitiveness. We are supporting SME exports and have allocated a huge amount of money for infrastructure investment, including some for regional growth. We are encouraging the free flow of funds from the Bank and fiscal consolidation. With regard to the International Monetary Fund, we cannot recover or be competitive without addressing the huge debt that we have incurred over the past 10 years. Our most important priority is to see how we reduce our national debt.