Coronavirus: Government Assistance

(asked on 4th June 2021) - View Source

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what estimate he has made of the amount of covid-19 business support grants that were paid directly to property owners whose tenants were granted that funding.


Answered by
Paul Scully Portrait
Paul Scully
This question was answered on 14th June 2021

The Government is committed to continuing to provide financial support via Local Authorities for businesses that are required to close, or which are severely affected by the restrictions put in place to tackle Covid-19 and save lives.

Both non-rate paying and rate paying businesses have been invited to apply for Covid business grants individually. The different elements of the Additional Restrictions Grant (ARG) and the mandatory grant schemes are designed so that both rate paying and non-rate paying businesses have access to grants. The ARG is a discretionary grant scheme and Local Authorities will decide whether to pay the business ratepayer or the occupying business (or both).

The Government has introduced a range of measures to support tenants struggling to pay rent: we introduced legislation that provides a moratorium on forfeitures of commercial leases owing to the non-payment of rent, reducing the ability of landlords to evict tenants if they cannot pay their rent due to Covid-19 restrictions. Government has also restricted landlords’ abilities to seize goods in lieu of unpaid rent by making changes to the use of Commercial Rent Arrears Recovery. We are protecting businesses from insolvency introducing, via the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020, restrictions on the service of statutory demands and winding-up petitions.

All these measures are in place until 30 June and we will make an announcement before then on their future. Government published a Code of Practice to help support rent negotiations and on 6 April published additional guidance to help landlords and tenants that have not yet been able to reach agreement about accrued rent arrears and ongoing lease terms.

Both BEIS and UKRI have refused grant payments to companies that cannot get a UK bank account in their own name. The BEIS Grant funding agreement template includes the condition that payments must be into a bank located in the UK.

We do not hold any of the further data requested. Data on Government allocations to, and payments by, Local Authorities, for Government Business Support Grants, is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-grant-funding-local-authority-payments-to-small-and-medium-businesses.

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