PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE
Small Businesses: Scaling Up - 31 October 2024 (Commons/Commons Chamber)

Our plan for small businesses will help them to scale up and increase productivity and growth. We are doing that by creating opportunities for businesses to compete and access the finance they need to scale, export and break into new markets. Furthermore, at yesterday’s Budget, we announced a small business Command Paper next year, which will set out more detail on how we will support small businesses.

I welcome the Minister’s answer. One way that we can support small businesses to scale up is through infrastructure investment, so that businesses can get their goods to market more quickly. Will the Department support my campaign to shift more freight from trucks to trains, starting with the channel tunnel in my constituency, where only 10% of its freight capacity is being used at present?

Let me take the opportunity to congratulate my hon. Friend on his election to this House. I remember well, as I am sure he does, the problems that the people and businesses of Kent had to endure when the M20 became a lorry park, thanks to a combination of poor planning by the last Government and the poor-quality trade deal they negotiated with Brussels. We certainly support the expansion of rail freight, not least as it helps to build the resilience of supply chains. I would be happy to meet him or facilitate a meeting for him with Transport Ministers, to hear more about his campaign.

Small businesses such as the Greek Corner in Shipley have benefited from Bradford council’s business growth programme, funded by the towns fund, which provides capital assistance for businesses to create new jobs. The support measures announced yesterday in the Chancellor’s Budget for local authorities and small businesses will be vital to revitalising our high streets. Does the Minister agree that local authorities working with local communities are best placed to direct investment, to help SMEs grow?

Let me take this opportunity to congratulate my hon. Friend on her election, too. I agree that local authorities working with local communities are fundamental to supporting SMEs in local economies. That is one reason why, as well as backing local authorities in yesterday’s Budget, we are backing Tracy Brabin, the excellent Mayor of West Yorkshire, with funding to support the priorities of local communities in constituencies such as that of my hon. Friend. It is also why we are introducing measures such as high street rental auctions and a powerful community right to buy, so that local communities can start the process of reviving their high streets.

I draw the attention of the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. The Minister mentioned that access to finance is vital for small business, but I hope he knows that the past few days have seen chaos in the motor finance market, with a number of major lenders suspending lending entirely in response to a judgment in the appeal court. This has caused consternation across the entire business lending sector. Can the Minister reassure us that the Government are fully engaged with the industry and the Financial Conduct Authority in sorting out an issue that could have a very, very significant impact on the entire sector and its supply chain?

We are certainly looking at the issues that have arisen for the industry from the judgment. More generally on access to finance, I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will welcome our launch, at the investment summit referenced by the Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade, my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Bromborough (Justin Madders), of the British Growth Partnership, which is aimed at unlocking investment in businesses that want to scale up.

Economic growth happens when micro-sized businesses become small businesses. We learned yesterday that micro-businesses that employ up to four full-time workers on the national living wage will be exempt from employers’ national insurance. Yet small businesses that employ five workers or more will be subject to employers’ national insurance. How will that measure help small businesses in the south-west to scale up and bring economic growth to the region?

I am glad that the hon. Gentleman welcomes, I think, the measures we took in the Budget to raise employment allowance to help the very smallest firms. The Federation of Small Businesses said yesterday that it will be a very big help for small firms. On his wider point about the Budget, I gently say to him, as I am sure he knows only too well, that the economic inheritance the Government face has led to our having to make some very tough decisions. If he does not support the measures we have set out in the Budget, he needs to say how he would finance the extra investment in the NHS and in industry that we have set out.

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

Wokingham has one of the highest rates of business survival when compared with the averages for the south-east and Berkshire, but yesterday’s announcement that the Government will raise employers’ national insurance throws that into doubt. The hike is, plain and simple, a tax on jobs that will deal a hammer blow to our small businesses. What will the Government do to mitigate the impact on small businesses in my constituency and across the country?

I say very gently to the hon. Gentleman that if he and his party are determined to oppose the measures we took in the Budget, including on employers’ national insurance contributions, they need to set out how they would fund the extra investment in the NHS, the investment in the automotive and aerospace sectors, and the measures to protect and raise living standards.