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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps he is taking to encourage entrepreneurship in BAME communities.

The Government is committed to supporting all entrepreneurs to start and grow a business and is a key aspect of our ambitious Industrial Strategy. The government supports diversity in business and recognises the valuable contribution of BAME communities to our economy.

British Business Bank programmes are also currently supporting over £5.9bn of finance to over 82,000 SMEs. The Start-Up Loans programme, now part of the British Business Bank, has delivered nearly 61,000 loans totalling over £464m, and was extended in the autumn budget to April 2021 to enable up to an additional 10,000 loans to be made to entrepreneurs. Of these 22% of loans were made to entrepreneurs with a BAME background (4% of existing SMEs have a BAME owner).

On 6^th March BEIS launched the Young Entrepreneurs Review, independently led by the Prince’s Trust. The Review will close in September 2019 and will seek to better understand young entrepreneurs, the specific barriers and opportunities they face, and what more can be done to support them to start and grow a business, including young entrepreneurs from a BAME background.