Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many SMEs in (a) Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency and (b) Bexley Borough received Government financial support in 2022.
Answered by Kevin Hollinrake - Minister of State (Department for Business and Trade)
Businesses in Bexleyheath and Crayford will have benefitted from the Government’s reversal of the National Insurance rise, saving SMEs approximately £4,200 on average, the cut to fuel duty for 12 months and raising the Employment Allowance to £5,000.
The Energy Bill Relief and Energy Bill Discount Schemes will protect SMEs from high energy costs over the winter. The Autumn Statement announced £13.6 billion of support for businesses over the next five years, reducing the burden of business rates for SMEs.
The Government is providing financial support – 128 SMEs in Bexleyheath and Crayford have received Start Up loans to the value of £1,377,883 and 331 SMEs in Bexley Borough to the value of £3,423,737.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many people have received the Warm Homes Discount in Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency as of 30 November 2022.
Answered by Graham Stuart - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The Government does not hold data on the number of rebate recipients by constituency. Energy suppliers are responsible for providing rebates to eligible households and are only required to report on the number of rebates provided in England, Scotland and Wales.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to support small business growth in (a) Bexley Borough, (b) Greater London and (c) England.
Answered by Paul Scully
Small and medium sized businesses (SMEs) are the backbone of our economy and have a key role to play in driving economic growth. The Government has taken action to support UK SMEs, including support with business rates; increasing the employment allowance; cutting corporation tax from 28% to 19% and exempting small and micro businesses from regulations where possible.
The London Borough of Bexley received £4,852,729 in Local Growth Funding which was delivered through the London Economic Action Partnership.
The British Business Bank’s Start Up Loans programme provides loans of up to £25,000 for those starting a new business, or for businesses which have been trading for up to 24 months. In addition to finance, loan recipients are offered a dedicated mentoring service and access to a free expert business mentor for 12 months to help them with every aspect of setting up a business.
The Start Up Loans programme has delivered over 91,000 loans totalling more than £830m (as at January 2022). 292 loans have been issued in Bexley, totalling over £2,979,262.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to improve social mobility.
Answered by Lee Rowley - Minister of State (Minister for Housing)
I refer my Rt. Hon. Friend to the answer given by my Hon. Friend the Minister for Equalities on 23 February 2022 (Official Report, Column 302-303) to Question 905707.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many businesses have received Government support during the ongoing covid-19 outbreak in (a) Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency, (b) Bexley Borough, (c) Greater London and (d) the UK.
Answered by Paul Scully
All data on Government allocations and Local Authority payments of Covid-19 grant schemes is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-grant-funding-local-authority-payments-to-small-and-medium-businesses.
Breakdowns of all Government Covid-19 loans by constituency, borough and regional area are available for download from the British Business Bank website.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what estimate he has made of the number of small businesses that have closed in (a) Greater London, (b) Bexley Borough and (c) the Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency in each of the last five years.
Answered by Paul Scully
Data on business closures by size of business are not available. The data provided in the table below cover all registered business closures for the years specified.
98.1% of all registered business are small (0 to 49 employees), according to the business counts published in 2020 by the Office for National Statistics in UK business: activity, size and location, so the vast majority of business closures are very likely to be small businesses.
Where available, data on business closures for all registered businesses over the last 5 years for each of the 3 geographies are shown in the table below:
Table: Number of business closures, all registered businesses, 2016 to 2020
| 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Greater London | 64,385 | 80,875 | 71,225 | 76,770 | 93,570* |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Bexley Borough | 1,025 | 1,380 | 1,220 | 995 | ** |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Bexleyheath and Crayford Constituency | ** | ** | ** | ** | ** |
Sources:
Office for National Statistics ‘Business Demography: 2019’
Office for National Statistics ‘Business Demography, quarterly experimental statistics, UK’
* Data from Office for National Statistics ‘Business Demography, quarterly experimental statistics, UK’. This may not be directly comparable to other data in the table which comes from Office for National Statistics ‘Business Demography: 2019’.
** No data available
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment his Department has made of the potential effect on the hospitality sector of support provided by the Government since the start of 2021.
Answered by Paul Scully
The Government has brought forward a substantial package of financial support for the hospitality sector since the start of the year. We keep these measures under close review and as a result my Rt hon Friend Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer set out in the Budget a £65 billion three-point plan to provide support for jobs and businesses (including the hospitality sector), with extensions to furlough, self-employed support, business grants, loans and VAT cuts – bringing total fiscal support to over £407 billion.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what support his Department is providing to businesses that are adversely affected by the covid-19 lockdown announced in January 2021.
Answered by Paul Scully
My Rt hon Friend Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer announced on the 5th January a further package of support for businesses that are required to close, or which are severely affected by the restrictions put in place to tackle Covid-19 and save lives.
Business that are mandated to close may be eligible for grants of up to £4,500 for every six weeks of closure through the Local Restrictions Support Grant Addendum: 5 January Onward. The Closed Business Lockdown Payment is a one-off payment of up to £9,000 to support business during the difficult Spring period.
A further £500 million of discretionary funding has been made available via the Additional Restrictions Grant, this may be used to support business who have not been mandated to close but had their trade severely affected by restrictions.
We have extended the application deadline for the Bounce Back Loan Scheme, the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme, and the Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme until 31 March 2021. Bounce Back Loan borrowers will also be able to top-up their loan, extend their loan term to ten years and take advantage of repayment holidays
The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme will remain open until the end of April 2021, with employees receiving 80% of their current salary for hours not worked, up to a maximum of £2,500.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how much financial support has been provided to the hospitality sector in (a) tier 1, (b) tier 2 and (c) tier 3 local covid alert level areas since the introduction of those restrictions.
Answered by Paul Scully
We are providing hospitality sector in Tiers 2 and 3 with a wide package of support to help them through the current crisis. This includes the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, government-backed loans, Local Restrictions Support Grants and additional funding provided to Local Authorities to support businesses. On 1 December, my Rt. Hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced an additional £1,000 Christmas grant for ‘wet-led pubs’ in tiers 2 and 3.
Asked by: David Evennett (Conservative - Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what estimate he has made of the number of pubs that have closed in (a) Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency, (b) Bexley Borough, (c) London and (d) England in each of the last 10 years.
Answered by Paul Scully
The ONS data below shows the overall number of public houses and bars in Bexleyheath and Crayford, Bexley Borough, London and England in each year from 2011 to 2020. Numbers of business closures specifically (VAT de-registrations) are not available at this level of industrial and geographical detail.
Number of Public House and Bar Local Units
Date | Bexleyheath and Crayford | Bexley | London* | England |
2011 | 95 | 40 | 3,795 | 36,455 |
2012 | 95 | 40 | 3,795 | 35,900 |
2013 | 95 | 35 | 3,685 | 34,670 |
2014 | 85 | 35 | 3,635 | 34,255 |
2015 | 90 | 40 | 3,690 | 34,215 |
2016 | 90 | 40 | 3,630 | 33,585 |
2017 | 95 | 40 | 3,545 | 33,045 |
2018 | 90 | 35 | 3,560 | 32,960 |
2019 | 85 | 35 | 3,550 | 33,305 |
2020 | 85 | 35 | 3,590 | 33,125 |
Source: ONS Business Counts. *Series break due to London geographical boundary change in 2016