Businesses: Government Assistance

(asked on 12th May 2020) - View Source

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, with reference to the Prime Minister's statement of 10 May 2020, what support the Government plans to provide to businesses in the event that measures to ease the covid-19 lockdown are reversed to control local covid-19 outbreaks; and what the planned timeframe for providing that support is.


Answered by
Paul Scully Portrait
Paul Scully
This question was answered on 21st May 2020

Thanks to the effort of the British public we are now at the stage where we can take the first steps to modifying the restrictions on social distancing including encouraging those who cannot work from home to go back to work. We will be monitoring the situation locally, regionally, and nationally and if there are outbreaks, we will not hesitate to put on the brakes.

We have published guidance for several work environments to help ensure workplaces are as safe as possible and have set out practical steps employers can take to enable staff to work safely. We will be keeping the guidance under review as and when we move through the steps my Rt. Hon. Friend the Prime Minister set out on 10 May. We continue to work with stakeholders on developing sensible guidance for businesses that will give UK workers the utmost confidence on their return to work.

My Rt. Hon. Friend Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer has announced unprecedented support for business and workers, including a Bounce Back Loans scheme and the extension of the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme to allow business to plan for the coming months with certainty.

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