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 it his policy to ensure that charities applying to the Recovery Loan Scheme are not required to demonstrate a negative impact arising from the covid-19 outbreak in order to secure finance.

Under the first two iterations of the Recovery Loan Scheme, all applicants had to self-certify that they had been impacted by Covid-19 to access finance through the scheme. This requirement no longer applies to most applicants. Charities can continue to access finance through the scheme where they can self-certify they have been impacted by Covid-19. This exempts them from the requirement to derive at least 50 per cent of their income from trading activity that they would otherwise need to meet to access the scheme.

This provision will cease at the end of the year. All aspects of the Recovery Loan Scheme are under constant review to ensure that the scheme meets its policy objectives.