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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether he plans to increase funding allocations for local authorities which have distributed their allocated funds from the Local Restrictions Support Grant (LRSG) and Additional Restrictions Grant (ARG) but have an additional need for emergency support.

The Government is committed to continuing to provide financial support via local authorities for business premises that are required to close due to restrictions that have been put in place to tackle Covid-19 and save lives.

BEIS will provide Local Authorities with the full costs of providing funding to eligible businesses that are required to close through Local Restrictions Support Grant (Closed). Where the initial allocation of this grant to Local Authorities is insufficient, it will be topped up.

Discretionary grants – Local Restrictions Support Grant (Open) and Additional Restrictions Grant - are formula based. With the announcement of a further period of national lockdown starting on 5^th January a further £500m has been allocated to Local Authorities via the Additional Restrictions Grant to support businesses severely affected by the restrictions even though they are not required to close, including those falling outside the business rates system such as market traders. This comes on top of £1.1bn already allocated in November 2020. It is expected that local authorities use this additional resource quickly to support businesses in their area.