Businesses: Linlithgow and East Falkirk

(asked on 9th June 2020) - View Source

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to support micro businesses in Linlithgow and East Falkirk constituency.


Answered by
Paul Scully Portrait
Paul Scully
This question was answered on 17th June 2020

Our aim is to make the UK the best place to start, scale up and grow a business and the Government is helping small businesses across the whole of the UK access the finance and support they need to succeed.

The British Business Bank’s (BBB) programmes are currently supporting over £7.4 billion of finance to over 93,000 small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) across the UK. Since launching in 2012, the BBB Start-Up Loans programme has issued over 3,500 loans in Scotland, averaging £7,200 each and worth over £25m in total. This includes 102 Start-Up Loans totalling £607,358 to companies in the Linlithgow and East Falkirk constituency.

In addition to its lending and investment activity, BBB’s online Finance Hub helps business owners to find the right finance options for their needs.

Government has taken further steps in recent years to support the growth of small businesses across the UK, including cutting corporation tax to 19 per cent and increasing the employment allowance from £2,000 to £3,000 to benefit around 1m businesses. Reforms and reliefs to business rates, are worth £13 billion over the next five years.

All businesses in Scotland, including your constituency may use the Scottish Government’s dedicated website to find out about and access business support via https://findbusinesssupport.gov.scot/ or by telephone: 0300 303 0660. (Monday to Friday, 09:30am to 5:30pm.)

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