2. Will the Minister provide an update on support for businesses in Caerphilly affected by the coronavirus pandemic? OQ56176

Yes, of course. In Caerphilly, the latest restrictions fund has seen over 1,500 businesses receive more than £4.5 million and the sector-specific fund has made 61 offers worth £478,000 to date.

I'd like to thank the Minister for meeting with representatives of businesses in Caerphilly and for the constructive responses that he gave. I just wanted to follow up on a few issues that have come out of that. Over the past few weeks, I've been contacted again by those businesses, who've expressed some concerns about the current financial package. One has said—a dance studio in Ystrad Mynach—that they cannot access support from the economic resilience fund due to them not paying their staff through PAYE, despite being in more or less the same position as other businesses of similar size otherwise. Another that contacted me is a farm park, who told me that the economic resilience fund cannot be used to support staff salaries even though the staff cannot be furloughed due to having to care for the park's animals. And I've had further concerns from representatives of the hair and beauty sector, who can't access support from the present round of ERF funding despite being unable to open. There's a fine line in the hospitality sector between being eligible and being not eligible, and I think, sometimes, businesses are falling on the wrong side of that fine line, which I'd like the Minister to address, and particularly with the next round of funding in mind. So, in the next round of funding, can those issues please be addressed to make sure that those businesses are catered for? And can he also tell us, with the First Minister having announced £200 million in the next round, when the detail of that next round of funding will be announced? 

Can I thank Hefin David not just for his questions, but also for the opportunity to meet with him recently and the representatives of businesses from Caerphilly? I thought it was a very valuable discussion that we had, and certainly we are always exploring how we can plug the gaps that people and businesses are falling through as a result of the UK Government and the Welsh Government schemes. Now, the Deputy Minister, I should, first of all, say, recently met with ExcludedUK—my colleague Jane Hutt—to discuss issues and problems faced by many millions of people across the United Kingdom, including here in Wales. In addition to this, the Minister for Finance and I recently wrote to the Chancellor, pressing him for further support to be made available to businesses and to working people. Today, Members may have seen that, in Prime Minister's questions, the Prime Minister was asked about extending business and employee support to ensure that fewer people and businesses fall through the gaps, and he said that a statement would be forthcoming regarding that very matter. 

Our package has been designed with, obviously, affordability in mind, but also with the available funding that we have, and sometimes we have had to make difficult decisions. But our purpose has been to plug as many gaps as possible left by UK Government schemes. And with regard to some of the examples that Hefin has outlined, and first of all the dance business, while a business without PAYE staff can't access the ERF sector fund, a business that has a rateable property would be able to, via their local authority, secure a grant of £3,000 or £5,000 from the ERF restrictions fund. And that also applies to the businesses within the hair and beauty sector. Now, Hefin is also right that, last Friday, the First Minister outlined an additional £200 million that will be made available to support businesses in the coming weeks. The details of that additional support package will be published very soon, in a matter of days. In the meanwhile, I should also assure Members that the discretionary fund operated by local authorities remains open to applications. That's a £25 million fund, and that fund is designed to allow businesses to secure grants of up to £2,000. 

Thank you, Minister. As an extension of that question, I wanted to ask you about businesses falling through the gaps because there are still quite a few businesses falling through the gaps. So, I welcome what you've said, and I look forward to seeing more detail and what you're planning to do about it. Can I ask you specifically about support for the self-employed who work from home and have recently set up new businesses? I've been contacted by a constituent who set up a new business venture in November of 2019, and, after undergoing the appropriate training he needed to do, he was planning on starting trading in that business in the early part of 2020. However, this couldn't happen because it entailed visiting people's homes, which was banned, obviously, under the coronavirus regulations. As a result, he made no profit and accrued a significant debt as a result of setting up his business. I'm just wondering what assistance you're providing to businesses like his who were very unlucky in the time they started their business, obviously. 

Can I thank Laura Jones for highlighting that particular case? And, obviously, if Laura Anne Jones would write to me with some of the detail, I will give it specific consideration as well to see whether we are able to assist. But, in general terms, in regard to start-up businesses, we did of course make available during the pandemic grants for start-ups to protect them, and within Caerphilly itself 84 start-up grants have been awarded, totalling more than £200,000, demonstrating the Welsh Government's commitment to start-ups. And we are currently considering further support for start-up businesses in the coming weeks and months as part of that overall package of support that has been announced by the First Minister. 

As stated by the Minister, we acknowledge that the support offered to Welsh businesses has been the most generous of all UK Governments. However, the finances available to Welsh businesses, even with the help of the UK Government, are patently not enough, given the number of businesses across all sectors who are either closing permanently or are shedding jobs at an alarming rate, as evidenced by three large retail outlets that have closed recently in Pontypool town centre. It is becoming increasingly obvious that the only possibility of stopping this catastrophic damage to the Welsh economy is to end the lockdowns. Could the Minister give any indication as to when this will happen so that those in desperate economic situations may see some light at the end of the tunnel?

Can I thank David Rowlands for his question and say that, first and foremost, this is an unprecedented crisis that we are facing globally? We have never faced such a pandemic in our lifetimes, and so the support that's required for businesses, of course, whilst it's been substantial indeed, goes no way to actually covering many of the additional costs and the loss of revenue that businesses would have experienced during the course of the pandemic. Most businesses want to be open, as I think all Members would recognise, rather than be forced to close due to lockdowns. 

The plan for emerging from lockdowns is pretty clear in terms of where we need to be in regard to test positivity and infection rates. But, in the meantime, we stand ready to support every business during this period of lockdown to ensure that they can survive. Again, in regard to the Caerphilly area, there are some excellent examples of how the Welsh Government has supported businesses and secured jobs in recent months—businesses like Bergstrom, IG Doors, Hydro Sapa, MII Engineering. Between those, we've been able to grant award more than £1 million and secure the best part of 1,000 jobs. That's an impressive achievement for Caerphilly and demonstrates how, in every single part of Wales, the Welsh Government is stepping in to secure employment, to save people's prospects.