Responding to the Business Finance Taskforce’s recent report, the National Association of Commercial Finance Brokers (NACFB) has ‘broadly welcomed’ its review, but says the key issue of funding smaller business remains unaddressed.
The report, published last week
, outlines 17 actions committed to by the Taskforce banks across three key areas in order to: improve customer relationships, ensure better access to finance and provide better information and promote understanding.Chief Executive of the
NACFB
, Adam Tyler, described the developments as ‘positive’, admitting they were ‘a step in the right direction’, but dismissed the proposed Business Growth Fund as being inadequate for the greater portion of SMEs.“One of the key recommendations was the setting up of a Business Growth Fund, an entirely new institution, which aims to make equity investments of between £2m and £10m in businesses with a turnover of between £10m and £100m.
“Obviously these businesses are at the larger end of the SME scale and this leaves the much greater portion of businesses, which are significantly smaller than this, without access to any additional finance support,” he said.
Made up of CEOs from the high street’s major lending institutions – Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds Banking Group, RBS, Santander, Standard Chartered and the British Bankers’ Association – the report follows July’s green paper, ‘Financing a private sector recovery’, intended to prompt lending to UK businesses.
The NACFB took part in the Taskforce’s discussions and proposals, and points to some areas in the report it believes will benefit smaller business, such as the proposed ‘network of mentors for support’ and ‘improved communication from the banks’ saying it welcomes this support.
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