“Our scheme is one of the most generous in the world.”
The Chancellor admitted that providing financial support for the self-employed has ‘been difficult to do in practise’ as they are a ‘diverse population with some people earning significant profits’.
He said: “I’ve taken steps to make this scheme deliverable and fair.”
“We know people are worrying about their jobs and their incomes, working closely with businesses and trade unions we have put together a coherent, coordinated and comprehensive economic plan.”
He says the plan is already starting to make a difference with big employers like Brewdog and Pret saying that the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme will help them ‘protect thousands of jobs’.
This evening the government will publish detailed guidance on how the scheme will operate so other businesses can protect jobs too.
There have been 30,000 enquiries from small businesses for the Coronavirus Business interruption loans of up to £5m, interest free for 12 months, and local authorities are already ‘informing over 700,000 retail, hospitality and leisure businesses that they will pay no business rates this year’.
He said: “If any business is struggling and worrying they may need to lose staff I would urge you to log on to businesssupport.gov.uk and look very carefully at what support is available before deciding to lay people off.”
“I’m proud of what we have done so far,” he added.
