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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, if he will make a comparative assessment of the level of investment in SMEs by (a) the British Business Bank and (b) private equity or venture capital firms in the UK.

The British Business Bank’s equity programmes operate through the market in partnership with the private sector, crowding in private sector investment into equity and venture capital (VC) funds in order to increase the amount and diversity of equity finance available to smaller businesses.

British Business Bank analysis of PitchBook data shows the British Business Bank to be the largest UK-based LP investor in UK VC funds between 2017 and 2022, based on amount committed and also the number of funds committed to. As at March 2022, the Bank had committed £3.836 billion into 357 equity funds, and these funds (including leveraged private sector funding) had invested £6.115 billion into 4,770 UK SMEs. The Bank estimates its equity programmes have supported around 14% of all announced equity deals between 2019 and 2021.