The team at Hinckley BID will continue to keep our BID Members up to date with information about anything we consider relevant including Grants and Loans as soon as the details are released.
From this Friday, the BID office will be closed but we have full IT capability and we can all work from home - ‘phone calls will be redirected to Steve Wegerif’s landline.
Last evening the Chancellor announced a further package for Businesses. The most important thing that he said was ‘there is no need for any business to cease trading due to the Coronavirus’.
There will be help for ALL businesses who need it, and details of the various schemes should be available from next Monday.
In a nutshell:
- The chancellor has announced 12-month business rates holidays for ALL retailers and pubs as part of a sweeping set of measures designed to support business in the face of the coronavirus outbreak.
- In order to offset the possibility of smaller businesses not being covered by insurance, The Chancellor said that he would provide cash grants of up to £25,000 per business to “help bridge through this period”.
- The government will be working with unions and business groups to “urgently develop new forms of employment support to protect people’s jobs and incomes through this period” . (More details will be announced soon).
- Chancellor Sunak unveiled a suite of government-backed loans and guarantees worth £330bn (equivalent to 15% of GDP), with the promise of more being made available should it be needed in the coming weeks and months. I understood that the first 6 months of any agreed loan would be interest free.
- The Chancellor said he would be opening a new lending facility with the Bank of England for large businesses and would extend the business interruption loan he announced last week from loans of up to £1.2m to up to £5m.
- Emergency legislation will be presented by the government on Thursday (tomorrow) to coordinate the response to coronavirus and will include the power “to offer whatever further financial support I decide is necessary”, Sunak said.
As soon as we have more information, we will send it to you.
Stay safe,
Steve Wegerif