Baroness Oppenheim-Barnes
Main Page: Baroness Oppenheim-Barnes (Conservative - Life peer)
Lord Marland
There is no doubt that the banks are not lending to the extent to which the Government would want, and this is something that we are looking at very closely. However, we cannot castigate banks and make sure that they increase their capital and at the same time ask them to increase their lending, so I understand the problem that the banks have. I could list loads of initiatives: we are spending £1 billion in the new business bank, and we have the new enterprise allowances, which are worth £80 million. We have Smart loan schemes up to £75 million, and we are mentoring people through Mentorsme. We have the growth accelerator to which I referred earlier and the enterprise finance guarantee, through which £800 million has been awarded so far. I am actually quite grateful for this question, as noble Lords can tell, and I hope that my answer satisfies the noble Lord.
Baroness Oppenheim-Barnes
My Lords, my noble friend has given the House some very good news indeed, but would he not agree that it is just as important to keep new businesses open as to open them, and to do so in many cases without the more onerous regulations under the Equality Act?
Lord Marland
There is no doubt that the two great threats to business are regulation and, of course, taxation. We are committed to reducing the level of regulation through our Red Tape Challenge. Of course, the most marvellous thing that the Lord Chancellor has done is to show a very clear pathway for the reduction in corporation tax—it is headlined down to 22% in two years’ time—which will make it the lowest in the G20. That is a really significant boost to business. For SMEs it is 20%, which is a very encouraging target.