Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment his Department has made of the accessibility of grants to research and development companies that have faced financial losses during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Amanda Solloway
The Government is aware of the pressures on business caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and has sought to protect R&D intensive businesses throughout the crisis, so they can continue to develop new innovative products and help power the UK’s recovery.
In April 2020, we announced a £1.25 billion package to help innovative firms through the pandemic. The comprehensive package included £750 million of targeted grant and loan support, delivered by Innovate UK, for small and medium sized businesses focusing on research and development.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment his Department has made of the adequacy of support available for research and development companies that are defined as an undertaking in difficulty due to losses as a result to the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Amanda Solloway
In order to be eligible for the Government’s Covid-19 debt schemes, businesses previously had to demonstrate that they were not an ‘undertaking in difficulty’ as of 31 December 2019. These requirements stem from EU state aid law.
In September 2020 the Government took advantage of increased flexibility in the Temporary Framework, allowing more businesses to gain eligibility for Government support – including the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) and the Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CLBILS). The new measures allowed for the assessment to be made at the date of application for the schemes.
A total of 182,196 businesses in the Professional, Scientific and Technical Activities sector, which includes a significant proportion of R&D businesses, have received over £1.72bn worth of support through these schemes. The Recovery Loan Scheme, which launched in April 2021, enables UK businesses to access loans and other kinds of finance up to £10 million per business as they grow and recover from the disruption of the Covid-19 pandemic. The scheme is open to R&D companies that are defined as an ‘undertaking in difficulty’, so long as the business is outside the scope of the Northern Ireland Protocol.
This unprecedented package of support comes in addition to £14.9 billion of investment that we have committed to research and development in 2021/22, which puts UK Government R&D spending at its highest level in four decades.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
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 ensure that tour operators in the travel sector can access Restart Grant funding.
Answered by Paul Scully
The Restart Grants announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on 3 March 2021 are one-off grants to businesses in the non-essential retail, hospitality, leisure, personal care and accommodation sectors, to support businesses to reopen as Covid-19 restrictions are relaxed. Non-essential retail businesses, such as travel agencies, are able to receive Restart Grants of up to £6,000.
All support is available through Local Authorities in England, as they administer all grant funding and take decisions on eligibility and the value of grant to be paid. The Government is working closely with Local Authorities to ensure that funding can get to the right places as quickly as practicable.
The main service principle will ultimately determine which threshold of Restart funding a business receives; this is based on what constitutes fifty per cent or more of the activity of the business in question. Businesses will need to declare their main service.
Local Authorities will need to exercise their reasonable judgement to determine whether or not a business is eligible for a grant, and under which funding threshold, and be satisfied that they have taken reasonable and practicable steps to pay eligible businesses, and to pay them the correct amount.
Further guidance can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/local-restrictions-support-grants-lrsg-and-additional-restrictions-grant-arg-guidance-for-local-authorities.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether wedding (a) caterers and (b) venues will be legally permitted to cater for a wedding reception held indoors from 12 April 2021.
Answered by Paul Scully
As detailed in the Government’s “COVID-19 Response – Spring 2021”, from no earlier than 12 April, weddings and receptions are permitted for up to 15 people. Further guidance will be published ahead of step 2 of reopening.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
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 plans to take to ensure that the proposed EDF development of Sizewell C nuclear power station promotes and embeds widespread and ongoing community engagement beyond what is required during the planning process in the event he decides to approve the Development Consent Order for that development.
Answered by Anne-Marie Trevelyan
As part of his assessment of the Sizewell C application, my Rt. Hon. Friend the Secretary of State may have to consider the extent of possible post-consent community engagement on a number of issues. Because of his quasi-judicial responsibility in respect of the decision on whether or not to grant development consent and, if he were to decide to grant consent, what form that consent would take, we cannot comment on the extent of measures which might be included in any consent that the Secretary of State might decide to grant.
Asked by: Dan Poulter (Labour - Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
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 plans to take to ensure that the Transport Review Group proposed by EDF for the development of Sizewell C nuclear power station has permanent and wider community representation in addition to drawing on the involvement of East Suffolk Council and Suffolk County Council.
Answered by Anne-Marie Trevelyan
Interested parties may wish to make representations about the composition of the Transport Review Group during the examination of the application for development consent for the Sizewell C nuclear power station. As that matter may form part of the examination and my Rt. Hon. Friend the Secretary of State’s consideration of that application, we are not able to comment further about the composition of that group.