Firms across UK face 'desperate situation' due to pandemic, says business group

The British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) called on the Chancellor to provide more financial support to businesses facing a “bleak future” from the debilitating squeeze of coronavirus restrictions.

The BCC said measures should include extending business rates relief, prolonging VAT deferrals and offering an immediate, further round of cash grant support.

More certainty is also needed to help protect jobs and livelihoods by maintaining the Job Retention Scheme until a full reopening of the economy is possible, said the BCC, adding that businesses cannot afford to wait until the Chancellor’s Budget in March.

Adam Marshall, director general of the BCC, said: “We have written to the Chancellor to highlight the desperate situation facing thousands of businesses all across the UK.

“The damage inflicted by the pandemic is widespread. It goes far beyond the very visible casualties hit by repeated stop-start lockdowns.

“The support schemes the Government has introduced so far have saved many firms and jobs, but they have not gone far enough to help many survive a tough start to 2021. The drip-feed approach to business support measures has meant many firms simply cannot plan for the future.

“We are urging the Government to urgently adopt a package of measures that covers the whole of 2021, and that takes away the cliff-edges firms face in a few weeks’ time when reliefs, forbearance and furlough are set to end. Many companies simply can’t wait until the March Budget.”

Andy Brown, managing director at Crow Wood Leisure, a health, fitness and leisure complex in east Lancashire, commented: “For every month we’re shut, we currently lose £250,000.

“Our business is not a tap that can be turned on and off at will, nor can it be meaningfully helped by the Government’s one-size-fits-all approach to financial support.”