Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many schemes in Northern Ireland have been supported by the Enterprise Finance Scheme since it was established.

The British Business Bank’s Enterprise Finance Guarantee (EFG) facilitates business loans to smaller businesses that are viable but unable to obtain finance from their lender due to having insufficient security to meet the lender’s normal requirements.

Since the Enterprise Finance Guarantee scheme commenced in January 2009, it has facilitated 290 loans to SMEs in Northern Ireland, with a total value of over £41m.