Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether his Department has contingency plans in place to provide financial support to Devolved Administrations for assistance to businesses in circumstances where the outbreak of covid-19 requires lockdown measures to be taken.
Public health is a devolved matter and so many of the health measures implemented across the UK in response to COVID-19 fall within the competence of the devolved administrations. COVID-19 has shown how the UK Government can work strategically and collaboratively with the devolved administrations to manage our response to the pandemic across the whole of the UK and it remains committed to continuing to do so.
Businesses in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are able to access UK-wide covid support, including:
- a reduced rate of VAT for tourism and hospitality - businesses in these sectors pay only 12.5% in VAT from 1 October until 31 March 2022, helping to support around 150,000 businesses and protect 2.4 million jobs UK-wide.
- continued access to Government-guaranteed finance for businesses across the UK, thanks to the extension of the Recovery Loan scheme to 30 June 2022.
The devolved administrations have also benefitted from an extra £12.6 billion through the Barnett formula this year – including an extra £1.3 billion confirmed at the recent Autumn Budget - taking total block grant funding in 2021-22 to £77.6 billion. This is enabling the devolved administrations to provide support to individuals, businesses and public services across Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland in relation to COVID-19.