Coronavirus: Disease Control

(asked on 19th October 2020) - View Source

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of automatically allocating additional financial and economic support to areas where covid-19 risks and associated restrictions are increased and prolonged relative to the rest of the UK.


Answered by
Kemi Badenoch Portrait
Kemi Badenoch
President of the Board of Trade
This question was answered on 27th October 2020

As measures to control the virus change, government support has evolved.

The government continues to take a flexible approach and recognises the evolving situation with the pandemic and health restrictions, and the impact this is having on areas. Which is why on 22 October, the Chancellor announced a package specifically for those businesses which are not forced to close, but face reduced demand due to additional social distancing restrictions:

o Two changes to the Job Support Scheme (JSS): there will be a significant reduction in the employer contribution to employee wages. And there will be also a reduction in time required for an employee to be in work. Both changes will benefit employers, provide greater flexibility and help protect more jobs.

o An increase in the generosity of the Self-Employed Income Support Scheme to mirror the new generosity of the JSS for employed workers.

o Additional funding to allow Local Authorities in Tier 2 areas to make cash grants to businesses that can remain open. These grants are primarily aimed at hospitality, leisure and accommodation business premises and are worth 70% of the value of the grants provided to closed businesses in Tier 3.

Moreover, in July we announced an unprecedented guarantee that the devolved administrations would receive at least £12.7 billion in additional resource funding this year to help them respond to Covid-19. As of 9 October, we have now uplifted that by £1.3 billion, to at least £14 billion. This means a total increase this year of at least £2.4 billion for the Northern Ireland Executive, on top of their Spring Budget 20 funding. This is in addition to the UK-wide measures that have directly supported the people and businesses in Northern Ireland. We continue to work with devolved administrations to support them contain the spread of Covid-19.

We continue to review our policies to ensure we are providing the right support to local areas under increased restrictions.

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