Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Morgan of Cotes Excerpts

Tuesday 13th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

The Office for Budget Responsibility is wholly independent. Decisions of the sort that the hon. Gentleman has described are a matter for the OBR to take on its own initiative—that is what having an independent body means.

[Nicky Morgan (Loughborough) (Con)]

The issue of business start-ups and supporting small companies has been mentioned this afternoon, but many of them are finding it very difficult to access bank financing. I was wondering how the Budget proposals will assist them, because growing the private sector is essential to improving our economy.

[Mr Hoban]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right about the importance of banks being in a position to lend in order to encourage the recovery. That is why in the Budget we announced an extension of the enterprise finance guarantee scheme by a further £200 million to enable the banks to lend to small businesses. We will be publishing a paper later this month on business finance, which, again, will put forward ideas about how we can continue to sustain the recovery by ensuring that the banks are in a position to lend.