Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps her Department is taking to ensure SMEs have equitable access to finance from banks.

The Government has an ambitious agenda to support UK SMEs and drive growth across bank and non-bank lending. We have increased the British Business Bank’s funding, bringing their capacity to £25.6bn, to support initiatives such as the Growth Guarantee Scheme to stimulate the provision of finance to SMEs. Meanwhile, reforms to credit data sharing and work to develop Open Finance aim to boost competition and address information gaps. Changes to bank capital and ringfencing also support a proportionate, effective framework for SME finance