Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to support SMEs in North East Hampshire.

Businesses in North East Hampshire will have benefitted from a range of Government measures, including reversal of the National Insurance rise, which will save SMEs approximately £4,200 on average, cut to fuel duty for 12 months and the Energy Bill Relief Scheme, which will protect small businesses from high energy costs over the winter. Furthermore, we have raised the Employment Allowance to £5,000 and are freezing the business rates multiplier for another year to protect businesses from rising inflation, worth £9.3 billion over the next 5 years.

In addition, finance is available to SMEs across the UK through the Recovery Loan Scheme, and the Start Up loan scheme has provided 84 SMEs in North East Hampshire with loans to the value of £926,620 as of October 2022.