Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill

Marcus Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 16th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Marcus Jones (Nuneaton) (Con)]

I welcome the Bill. I think it significant that we are debating a small business Bill, because I know that, for far too long, many people who run small businesses and many of the organisations that represent them have felt that they are “out of the tent” when the Government make decisions and produce legislation that affect businesses. They feel that they are the Cinderella of the business world when it comes to Government engagement.

Today, we should welcome the fact that small business has a voice. Organisations such as the Federation of Small Businesses certainly have a voice: many of their recommendations appear in the Bill. We should listen to those organisations, because small businesses are extremely important. They have created 2 million private sector jobs in the last four years, 2,000 of them in my constituency, and have driven down the unemployment rate. Unemployment has fallen by 26% in my constituency in the last 12 months, and youth unemployment has fallen by 38% during the same period. We need to engage with small businesses and listen to what they say in order to find out what they want us to do to enable them to create the jobs that we need.

The Bill comes off the back of a number of other measures that the Government have taken to help small business. They have, for instance, extended small business rate relief, introduced the employment allowance, frozen fuel duty, cut beer duty, and reduced corporation tax to the lowest rate in the G20.

In the short time that I have, I want to say a few words about specific parts of the Bill. Many businesses come to me with problems caused by late payments, which are dealt with in part 1. In the last week alone two people who run small businesses in my constituency have mentioned the issue of late payment to me. It is extremely important at the moment when a lot of businesses are expanding. Often when businesses try to expand after a recession, they hit cash flow issues, and the Bill’s measures on late payment will be extremely important in assisting them.

Turning to part 3 on public sector procurement, many of my constituents would probably also like to see something in the Bill about prequalification questionnaires and reducing the burden of them for small businesses. It would be a good signal from Government if there were something in the Bill about late payment from Government organisations and local authorities, too. When I was a local authority leader in the depths of the great Labour recession in 2008-09, we made our payment terms 10 days and many local small businesses benefited from that.

Many of my pub landlords who are pubco lessees will welcome part 4, but we need to be careful to avoid unintended consequences, particularly in terms of the effect on family brewers and their cost base. We must also properly recognise the role of franchises, which now seem to be coming to the fore. I have at least one pub in my constituency that is owned by Marston’s and is franchised, and it is important that that is recognised as well in this Bill.

Finally, I want to talk about part 9 of the Bill. Many small businesses in my constituency have fallen foul of rogue directors, some of whom seem to have the habit of setting up businesses, failing them and abandoning all their creditors, and then starting up businesses again very soon afterwards. We need to have a culture where we do not think it is completely awful to fail, and we need to make sure our entrepreneurs feel that they can fail at times. However, people who habitually cause major distress in this way to other businesses—many of them small businesses, some of which then go out of business—need to be dealt with, and I hope the provisions in part 9 will go some way towards doing that.

I am pleased with this Bill. I am extremely pleased that it is a Bill for small business, and I am very enthusiastic about seeing it pass through the House. I hope I will be able to say a little more on Report.