Jason McCartney
Main Page: Jason McCartney (Conservative - Colne Valley)Department Debates - View all Jason McCartney's debates with the Department for Education
(13 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Vince Cable
As the hon. Gentleman knows, the feed-in tariff consultation is being conducted by the Department of Energy and Climate Change, but I will certainly communicate his concerns to it.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
T10. I am very lucky to have many successful manufacturing businesses in my constituency, and I am always one to talk up our manufacturing expertise, whether it is David Brown Engineering in Lockwood, Thornton and Ross pharmaceuticals in Linthwaite, Equi-Trek horseboxes in Meltham or any one of many others. However, some of my smaller businesses are still reporting problems with bank lending. How aware is the ministerial team of this problem, and what can we do to help such businesses to achieve multimillion pound turnovers?
Vince Cable
The hon. Gentleman is right that manufacturing is a success story. It is now growing at double-digit levels annually, in stark contrast with what happened in the period after 1997, when we had a hollowing out of manufacturing more rapid than anywhere else in the world. However, he is right that there is a threat to small and medium-sized enterprises in particular from bank lending practices. We have secured commitments to 15% more lending from the banks, but much more needs to be done.