Small Businesses: Coronavirus

(asked on 3rd July 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, if he will take steps to review the criteria for distributing and allocating funding through the Discretionary Grant Fund to local councils for supporting businesses during the covid-19 outbreak.


Answered by
Paul Scully Portrait
Paul Scully
This question was answered on 13th July 2020

The?Local Authority Discretionary Grants Fund is aimed at small businesses with ongoing fixed property-related costs that are not liable for business rates or rates reliefs.

Local authorities are responsible for defining the precise eligibility for this Fund?and?may choose to make payments to other businesses based on local economic need,?subject to those businesses meeting the specific eligibility criteria.

We are asking local authorities to prioritise the following types of businesses for grants from within this funding pot:

  • Small businesses in shared offices or other flexible workspaces. Examples could include units in industrial parks, science parks, and incubators which do not have their own business rates assessment.
  • Regular market traders with fixed building costs, such as rent, who do not have their own business rates assessment.
  • Bed & breakfasts which pay Council Tax instead of business rates.
  • Charity properties in receipt of Charitable Rate Relief, which would otherwise have been eligible for Small Business Rates Relief or Rural Rate Relief.

Businesses already in receipt of the Small Business grant or a Retail, Hospitality and Leisure grant are not eligible for this fund.?Businesses who are eligible for or in receipt of the Self-Employment Income Support Scheme are now eligible to apply for this scheme.

There is currently no plan to change eligibility criteria for this scheme. Officials are keeping in close contact with local authorities to monitor the progress of the scheme.

Guidance for Local Authorities was published 13 May: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-guidance-on-business-support-grant-funding.

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