Minutes

Items
No. Item

1.

Local Restrictions Business Support Grant

Minutes:

2          LOCAL RESTRICTIONS BUSINESS SUPPORT GRANT – The Director: Business Development submitted an urgent report seeking approval for payment of the new grant support being made available to businesses.

 

Following the implementation of national restrictions on 5 November 2020, the Government had announced additional funding to support cash grants primarily for businesses who have had to close and those who may be adversely impacted but able to operate.

 

These were categorised into two schemes:

 

·        Local Restrictions Support Grant (Closed)

·        Additional Restrictions Grant

 

The council had been awarded the following for each grant:

 

·        Local Restrictions Support Grant (Closed) - £2,511,918

·        Additional Restrictions Grant - £3,445,840

 

The Government had also set out the levels of interventions for the local restrictions grant paid monthly whilst restrictions were in place:

 

Rateable Value Above

Grant per month

£0

£ 1,334

£15,001

£2,000

£51,000

£3,000

 

           

In addition to this grant, businesses impacted by the tier 2 restrictions would also receive a pro-rata amount for the days that North Lincolnshire were in Tier 2 restrictions.  This would equate to the following amount:

 

Rateable Value Above

Grant per month

£0

£ 155

£15,001

£ 233

£51,000

£ 350

           

 

The discretionary grant fund to support business was designed to support North Lincolnshire’s economy during this period and work towards economic recovery. The funding was in place up until March 2022.

 

The discretionary fund created for the following categories:

 

·        Business required to close but do not appear on the business rate listing.

·        Business severely impacted by restrictions but not forced to close.

·        Initiatives to support economic recovery

 

The discretionary fund included clear eligibility requirements for businesses to apply for this scheme and set amounts of funding, these were outlined in the table at Appendix 1 to the report.

 

The matter was urgent in order to enable grant payments to be made to eligible businesses as quickly as possible, in response to and in accordance with government guidelines.

 

Resolved – That the business support grant outlined at Appendix 1 to the report be approved.