The role of smart government in the UK’s post pandemic recovery August 4, 2021 Picture this: a country where 99% of public services are online, citizens vote via digital ID cards over the web, welfare and financial support are provided only to those who need it, with fraud dealt with swiftly, and transparency, trust and efficiency lie at the heart of government. This is a far cry from the [...]
200,000 more people furloughed last month as 4.7m are still on the scheme March 25, 2021 Another 200,000 people were put on furlough for the first time last month as the government paid out nearly £4bn to cover wages. HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) said it had paid £57.7bn in furlough cash to around 11.4m people since the pandemic began. Around 4.7m people were still on furlough by the end of [...]
Covid support scheme lands Funding Circle record loans under management March 25, 2021 The number of loans under management at lending platform Funding Circle hit a record in 2020, with the firm’s involvement in the Covid support scheme giving a boost to the business. In 2020 Funding Circle achieved record loans under management of £4.21bn, up from £3.73bn in 2019 – a 13 per cent increase. The lender [...]
City police opened 50 per cent more Covid loan fraud probes in February May 24, 2021 City of London police commenced 50 per cent more investigation into fraud connected to the government’s Bounce Back Loan scheme (BBLs) in February than the prior month. Police opened 26 such probes in February, up from 17 in January, international law firm RPC said. It opened a further 28 in March. Back in October the [...]
UK business groups give backing to Bounce Back Loans repayment extension February 8, 2021 The UK’s largest business advocacy groups have backed Rishi Sunak’s move to offer more generous repayment terms on £45bn of emergency Covid Bounce Back Loans. The Treasury announced yesterday that the 1.4m businesses who have taken out a Bounce Back Loan will be able to pay it back over ten years instead of six, make [...]
Covid: UK bank lending surged £29.3bn since March, surpassing EU March 29, 2021 UK bank lending has surged by eight per cent to keep businesses afloat since the pandemic began, surpassing EU lending, according to a new study by UHY released this morning. Banks have offered around £29.3bn in businesses loans over the past year, as lending in the EU increased by an average of 5.3 per cent. [...]
The furlough scheme protected our economy but now it has to come to an end September 10, 2021 Around nine million jobs were furloughed at the height of the first lockdown in spring 2020 – almost a third of the entire workforce. While the furlough scheme has not been able to protect every job, unemployment during the pandemic could well have numbered in the millions without it – as happened in countries, like [...]
Relaxed subsidies rules are a free rein to pick winners without transparency March 16, 2022 Not too long ago the thorniest issue in the United Kingdom’s relationship with Europe was about the “level playing field” and “state aid”. It may seem crazy in retrospect, but there was a serious prospect in late 2020 that the UK would sacrifice a trade deal with our closest neighbour to be freer to subsidise [...]
Exclusive: ‘Normal’ bank lending to SMEs down 10 per cent in 2020 as emergency loan use explodes February 10, 2021 Non-emergency lending by banks to SMEs dropped 10 per cent in 2020, while emergency coronavirus funding ballooned. ‘Normal’ lending to SMEs fell from £168bn in December 2019 to £152bn a year later, research by debt specialist ACP Altenburg Advisory found. At the same time, emergency coronavirus funding via the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBLIS) [...]
Government set to write off estimated £31bn of pandemic loans January 29, 2021 An estimate of £31bn of government loans handed out during the pandemic will have to be written off, according to the UK’s spending watchdog. In its latest Covid-19 Cost Tracker, the National Audit Office (NAO) forecast that the total cost of the pandemic for Britain will balloon to £271bn, of which £116bn has been spent [...]