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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, pursuant to the Answer to Question 113639, what assessment he has made of the compatibility of the grant of (a) £194,420 to the City of London on the basis of 24,020 businesses listed resulting in approximately £8 per business to distribute and (b) £4,849,340 to Islington on the basis of 21,175 businesses listed resulting in approximately £229 per business to distribute with his Department's policy to achieve a fairly equal distribution of Additional Restrictions Grant.

The Additional Restrictions Grant is a discretionary scheme and is one of many business support schemes put in place during local and national Covid-19 restrictions. Local authorities have the flexibility to provide grants of any size to businesses and/or to fund wider business support.

Whichever formula is used to calculate grant allocations will result in a range of results with some areas receiving more than others. The method used provides a fairly equal distribution overall.

Both the City of London and the City of Westminster also receive a Local Restrictions Support grant for businesses that are required to close (£4.8 million and £21.8 million respectively), as well as discretionary grant funding related to the period that they were in Local Coronavirus Alert Level High (‘Tier 2’) (£907,000 and £3.8 million respectively).