Trade and Investment for Growth White Paper

Margot James Excerpts

Wednesday 9th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

We want to help small businesses, but we intend to do so in a more cost-effective way, and in a more effective way overall. The support for trade finance that I have described is specifically directed at small enterprises. As for the other schemes, such as mentoring, which the right hon. Gentleman will know about through my colleague the Minister of State, Lord Green, we are putting in place a whole series of measures that are focused specifically on the SME community.

[Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)]

I congratulate the Secretary of State on extending the remit of the Export Credits Guarantee Department into small business support, but will he review the department’s performance and structure further? I refer in particular to the fact that 90% of the support that it provides goes to the aerospace industry. That shows a real imbalance, and there are other problems with the functioning of that department too.