Covid-19 Corporate Financing Facility: Disclosure of Information

(asked on 3rd June 2020) - View Source

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to the provision of loans to businesses by the Government's Covid Corporate Financing Facility, whether information on the items of expenditure that businesses require those loans for will be (a) published (i) directly, (ii) in an anonymised and (iii) in a summarised form or (b) provided upon request in an anonymised form under Freedom of Information legislation.


Answered by
John Glen Portrait
John Glen
Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
This question was answered on 8th June 2020

The Covid Corporate Financing Facility is designed to support companies who would ordinarily seek market-based finance to strengthen working capital, but find themselves struggling to access financial markets in this uncertain operating environment. It primarily provides bridging support to see through the temporary nature of Covid-19 related disruption, by catalyzing the market for short term corporate funding.

Since 19 May the Government has imposed restraints on capital distributions (including dividends and share buybacks), as well as senior pay, on companies accessing the CCFF. Firms must provide a letter of commitment to these constraints to HMT, which HMT reserves the right to publish if it becomes aware the terms of the letter have not been complied with.

In order to ensure support can be provided quickly, and in a broad-based manner, those are the only conditions imposed on participating firms at this time. Firms must meet strict criteria to access the CCFF so that the Government is confident the funds will be repaid.

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