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 of 22 December 2017 to Question 120177, on Small Businesses: Productivity, what the Department’s programme of engagement will consist of.

I would refer to our response to questions 120177 and 120170 and would restate that the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy regularly engages with the major business representative organisations, including the Federation of Small Businesses and the British Chambers of Commerce, on a wide range of issues.

We are already engaging directly with private and public sector business on a variety of issues, through a series of regional roundtables. This involves businesses around England and including most recently, Stockton on Tees in the North East.

The review of productivity will focus on what actions could be most effective in improving productivity and growth of SMEs. We will announce the policies we intend to take forward, following this review, in autumn 2018.