Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, whether he has considered convening a cross-agency taskforce with the (a) Financial Conduct Authority, (b) Prudential Regulation Authority, (c) British Business Bank, (d) HM Treasury and (e) Lending Standards Board to develop a joined-up strategy to embed the ethnicity code across the financial system.

The government’s approach to support equitable outcomes for businesses led by ethnic minorities and other underserved groups is to work with the financial services sector, building on a shared commitment to fairness and equality and exchanging knowledge of good practice.

Earlier this year the government published a Call for Evidence on small business access to finance, which included the experiences of ethnic minority-led businesses and other underserved groups, and will be publishing our response to this in the Autumn and the further steps we will take.