Croydon BID demands greater grant support from Government

21-Apr-2020 - Last updated on 13-Jul-2020 at 15:20 GMT

Related tags Grant Croydon Government Coronavirus

Croydon Business Improvement District (BID) has launched a campaign calling on the Government to raise the threshold on its Retail and Hospitality Grant Scheme so that more businesses can benefit.

Under the current grant scheme, only the smallest business with a property that has a rateable value of up to £51,000 are eligible.

The #RaiseTheBar campaign, which is backed by a number of industry bodies including UKHospitality, is demanding the threshold be raised to include any business with a rateable value up to and including £150,000.

It argues that the current threshold is “far too low to provide adequate support” for the sector, and raising it to £150,000 would benefit more than 13,000 businesses in London alone.

Regarding the Government’s Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme, it adds that many businesses are not in a position to take on further debt, or have serious misgivings about being able to survive the recovery and service loans.

“We acknowledge that by increasing the [grant scheme] threshold up to and including £150,000 will increase the burden on central and local government,” says Matthew Sims, chief executive of Croydon BID.

“This is a price we believe is worth paying to ensure businesses are given the opportunity to become part of the greater push to mobilise our economy, rather than leaving premises empty, growing unemployment with or without the job retention scheme and sectors contracting across the board.”

For more information on the #RaiseTheBar campaign, click here.