Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what recent assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the Help to Grow Programme; and if he will publish the outcome for business growth broken down by the gender of business owners.

Longer term impacts on productivity can take 3-7 years to be measurable, however early findings show promising impacts. Over 90% of participants are satisfied with the programme and within 6 months of completion, most participants surveyed reported enhanced firm resilience, sales and cost savings. Early impact analysis on productivity is underway and future reports will address variations in productivity impacts by gender, should these arise.

Evaluation findings on the early impacts of Help to Grow: Management are available on GOV.UK and the next release will be later this year.