Asked by: Viscount Trenchard (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether the guidelines issued to lenders participating in the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loans Scheme permit such lenders to require that an SME director pledge personal assets in order to receive a Government guarantee of 80 per cent on each loan; and what guidance has been issued to lenders on the terms of such lending.
Answered by Lord Callanan - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The terms of the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) state that Personal Guarantees of any form (whether or not these include the pledging of personal assets) cannot be used in respect of any CBILS facilities up to £250,000.
Personal guarantees for CBILS facilities above £250,000 are not required by the scheme rules. They may be taken at the lender’s discretion. If that is the case, recoveries under such guarantees are capped at a maximum of 20% of the outstanding balance of the CBILS facility after the proceeds of business assets, if any, have been applied.
A Principal Private Residence cannot be taken as security to support a personal guarantee or as security for any CBILS facility.
These terms were updated on 3 April 2020 and will be retrospectively applied for any CBILS facilities offered since the start of the scheme on 23 March 2020. This means that any personal guarantees already taken for CBILS facilities up to £250,000 will be waived.
Asked by: Viscount Trenchard (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to extend the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme to freelance workers, and in particular, to those who work in the music festivals sector.
Answered by Lord Agnew of Oulton
The Chancellor of the Exchequer announced new support for the self-employed on 26 March 2020.
The new Self-Employed Income Support Scheme will help those with lost trading profits due to COVID-19. It will allow eligible individuals to claim a taxable grant worth 80% of their trading profits up to a maximum of £2,500 per month for the next 3 months. This may be extended if needed and is one of the most generous self-employed support schemes in the world.
To qualify, an individual’s self-employed trading profits must be less than £50,000 and more than half of their income comes from self-employment. 95% of people who receive the majority of their income from self-employment will be eligible for this scheme.
HM Revenue & Customs will contact individuals if they are eligible for and invite them to apply online using a simple form. HMRC are working on this urgently and expect people to be able to access the Scheme no later than the beginning of June.
More information about the Scheme, including the full eligibility criteria and how to claim, is available on GOV.UK.
The Scheme supplements the significant support already announced for UK businesses and employees, including the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme, the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, and deferral of tax payments.
More information about the full range of business support measures is available on GOV.UK.
Asked by: Viscount Trenchard (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme is weighted for London; and what plans they have for those whose salaries exceed the threshold of the Scheme.
Answered by Lord Agnew of Oulton
The grant provided in the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme is not weighted for London. Any UK organisation with employees can apply for cash grants of 80% of employees’ wages up to a cap of £2,500 per month.
This grant is not designed to subsidise those on very high wages. The cap of £2,500 per month is above the UK median earnings level.
Asked by: Viscount Trenchard (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether all festival businesses whose financial viability have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic will be eligible to receive loans equal to the amount of financial damage they have suffered as a direct result of the pandemic; and whether any such loans will require owners or directors of these businesses to pledge their personal assets.
Answered by Lord Agnew of Oulton
The government has announced a significant package of financial support for all businesses and organisations, including through the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme. Details of this package are available at: www.businesssupport.gov.uk. The government has taken new legal powers in the COVID-19 Bill, enabling it to offer whatever further financial support it thinks necessary to support businesses.Asked by: Viscount Trenchard (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to suspend the provisions of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 which require refunds for the cancellation of events to be paid within 14 days of request.
Answered by Lord Callanan - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The Government recognises the extremely difficult circumstances businesses are currently facing, which is why on 17 March the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced a wide range of support for businesses, in addition to the £30bn of support announced in the budget. The Government is keeping the relevant rules under review.
Asked by: Viscount Trenchard (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to provide loans to music festival operators to cover a fixed percentage of staff salaries during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The Chancellor of the Exchequer has announced additional measures to support businesses and organisations that have been impacted by the pandemic. So long as they fulfil the criteria for these measures, businesses in the retail, leisure and hospitality sectors will benefit from these measures.
This includes the Government stepping in to help pay people’s wages – a scheme which is one of the most generous of any in the world – and paying grants to support as many jobs as necessary. Any employer in the country who promises to retain their staff can apply for a grant to cover most of the cost of paying people’s wages. Government grants will cover 80 per cent of the salary of retained workers up to a total of £2,500 a month, with this limit set well above the median income. The cost of wages will be backdated to 1st March and will be open for at least three months. The Government will consider extending the scheme for longer if necessary.
We are also deferring the next three months of VAT, a direct injection of £33 billion of cash to employers which means no business will pay any VAT in March, April or May; and they will have until the end of the financial year to repay those bills.
The Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme will now be interest free for twelve months, an extension from the initial announcement of six months. We have already introduced and announced an extension to the Business Interruption Loan Scheme, which is for small and medium-sized businesses. On 17 March, the Chancellor expanded the amount that can be borrowed from £1.2 million to £5 million.
The Chancellor has also announced measures to protect the self-employed. As long as they fulfil the necessary criteria, freelancers and the self-employed in the music industry will benefit from these measures. The Self-employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS) will support self-employed individuals (including members of partnerships) whose income has been negatively impacted by COVID-19. The scheme will provide a grant to self-employed individuals or partnerships, worth 80% of their profits up to a cap of £2,500 per month.
Asked by: Viscount Trenchard (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether the decision of the European Council concerning a new settlement for the UK within the EU, which states that "not all member states have the euro as their currency", means that the Financial Services Compensation reduction of the deposit protection limit from £85,000 to £75,000 will be reversed, and whether in future such fixed sterling amounts will not be subject to amendment according to exchange rate movements.
Answered by Lord O'Neill of Gatley
The Government has made representations to the European Commission to suggest that the reviews of the Deposit Guarantee Scheme Directive coverage level in non-euro states should occur after the Commission completes its review of suitability of the coverage level as a whole and also that changes for non-euro states reflect genuine, very large and lasting changes in exchange rates.