New grants announced to boost recovery of small businesses

The government has announced two new grants to support small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) to access specialist advice. These are aimed at helping to further mitigate the impacts of COVID-19 by building in resilience for the future or addressing potential new opportunities.

• Kick-starting tourism – specialist advice and support for SMEs in the visitor economy

• SME grant funding – specialist advice and support for SMEs across other sectors

We are working closely with Leeds City Region Enterprise Partnership (LEP) who have been awarded £1.8m to support businesses across North Yorkshire (Craven, Hambleton, Harrogate, Richmondshire, Ryedale, Scarborough, Selby and York), and West Yorkshire (Bradford, Calderdale, Kirklees, Leeds and Wakefield).

Grants of between £1,000 – £3,000 will be available to help SMEs that have been directly impacted by the coronavirus pandemic, to access professional support including:

• digital
• legal
• HR
• finance
• health and safety
• other consultancy advice.

Alternatively, it can used to purchase minor equipment that will enable you to adapt or adopt new technology in order to continue to deliver business activity or diversify in response to COVID 19.

Grants will cover 100% of costs, excluding VAT. Once an application has been approved, businesses will be required to make the payment for the support or purchase and make a claim for the grant.

Please note, this scheme is not yet open for applications.

Both schemes should open to applications in mid-September 2020. However, you can register your interest at the following places, and we will contact you with additional information as soon as it becomes available and when the scheme is open for applications.

• Register your interest in the Kick-starting tourism grant
• Register your interest in the SME grant funding

You can also keep up to date via our website and social media channels. You can also sign up to receive emails on the latest business support news.