Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he has made an assessment of the effect of VAT regulations on the financial sustainability of small businesses that have been affected by the covid-19 outbreak.

All eligible businesses in the retail, hospitality and leisure sectors will pay no business rates in England for 12 months from 1 April 2020, and the Government deferred Value Added Tax (VAT) payments so UK VAT registered businesses did not need to pay any VAT due with VAT returns from 20 March through to the end of June 2020, until 31 March 2021.

HMRC’s Time to Pay service is available to all businesses needing support with tax payments.

Statistics on the use of the VAT deferral are available online: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/hmrc-coronavirus-covid-19-statistics