§ Mr. Neil Hamiltonasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what is the total amount of finance provided to date through the business start-up and business expansion schemes; and what percentage of the total has been provided through approved funds;
(2) how many businesses have received finance through the business start-up scheme and the business expansion scheme; and how many of these were financed through approved funds.
§ Mr. Moore[pursuant to his reply, 12 July 19841: Firm figures are not yet available, but we estimate that at least £55 million was invested under the business expansion scheme in 1983–84. Of this, we know that just over £39 million (71 per cent.) was invested via the approved funds. (This includes about £11 mill ion raised by the funds from subscribers prior to 5 April 1983 and carried forward for 687W investment under the BES). We believe that direct investment under the BES in 1983–84 amounted to a further £15 million at least, but firm figures will not be available until all investors have actually claimed their relief. We estimate that in total about 300 companies raised money under the scheme in 1983–84, but this figure may be subject to a very wide margin of error.
We estimate that the total amount invested in companies under the business start-up scheme over the two year period 6 April 1981–5 April 1983 was about £18 million, of which about £13 million (72 per cent.) was invested via the approved funds, and that there were investments in about 250 companies under the BSS—but again this latter figure is subject to a wide margin of error.