Business Start-ups

HC Deb 02 February 2004 vol 417 cc644-5W

Mr. Woodward

To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many businesses, and of what type, have received assistance in starting up from government schemes and initiatives in(a) St. Helens, (b) Merseyside and (c) the North West in each year from 1992. [144321]

Nigel Griffiths

Government support to start-up businesses is delivered primarily through a network of Business Link Operators under contact to the Small Business Service, an agency of the DTI. Numbers of start-up businesses assisted through this network in St. Helens, Merseyside and the North West from April 2001 are as follows:

	St. Helens	Merseyside	North West
2001–02	4	330	1—
2002–03	23	667	1,623
2003–04 (To date)	17	579	3,502
1Total business start-ups not recorded separately at regional level before April 2002.