Areas with Additional Public Health Restrictions: Economic Support

Baroness Verma Excerpts

Wednesday 7th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, my understanding is that there is ongoing communication with local leaders in all the areas affected by local lockdowns. I am sure we can always do better, and we will continue to strive to do so. The noble Baroness is absolutely right that the economy in different parts of the country is incredibly different, so we will work with local leaders to try to reflect that in our response. We have provided some national measures to support jobs, but there will also need to be a local response in areas that have the severest restrictions.

[Baroness Verma (Con)]

My Lords, will my noble friend look at cities such as my own, Leicester, where we have been in a second lockdown since June and where sole traders and small businesses have really struggled to access the packages that the Government have generously put forward? They have just failed to be able to get the money and are really struggling. We have been in lockdown for a very long time in Leicester, and those businesses will go out of business if there is no support, so will my noble friend be willing to have a meeting with some of those small businesses and sole traders, just to see if there are things that they have missed out on?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I will take that request back to the Treasury. I would be happy to meet local leaders, but it may be that someone else might be slightly more appropriate. There may be small businesses and sole traders that feel they might not qualify for the support, many of which actually would qualify for bounce-back loans. A further piece of reassurance that can be given to them is the change in repayment terms for those loans, bringing down the monthly repayments, should they wish to take advantage of that. I also emphasise to those local businesses that local councils in areas such as Leicester have been given funding to provide support for local businesses that might not meet one set of criteria or another but still rightly expect some kind of support from the Government. I urge them to engage with councils and ask how they can access that additional funding provided by the Government.