A Labour Lord, a Business Bank manager and the FLA were all in attendance at an asset finance seminar in Westminster yesterday, the first of its kind since the withdrawal of ING Lease from the market.

The third annual seminar, hosted by the National Association of Commercial Finance Brokers (NACFB), was held at Church House in Westminster and around 100 delegates were in attendance.

Adam Tyler, CEO of the NACFB, introduced the first panel to discuss changes to the asset finance broker market.

There was a 16 per cent fall in new business in December 2012 to £260 million, yet despite contraction in December the broker market reported growth of 9 per cent in Q4 2012; annual new business grew by 12 per cent to almost £3.8 billion.

The panel addressed the first question: was the withdrawal of ING cataclysmic? The universal response was that it wasn’t as there are now more funders in the market than ever before.

However, panellists were cautious in their responses as there has only been a short time since November – the month in which it exited - to fully assess the £1 billion hole left by the former market-leader for UK SMEs.

The session went on to state that the NACFB’s patron numbers are at an all-time high with 92 patron funders on board with the Association at present.

Even more encouraging, Mike Francis, Managing Director of Investec, stated that weekly total figures on their application sizes so far in February 2013 have been in the region of £32 million, as opposed to £11 million in February last year.

Richard Briscoe, Managing Director of Close Brothers Business Finance, disclosed to the delegates that Close has increased its level of funding by £70 million over the last two years.

There was however consideration about how brokers could work together with funders in marketing products more effectively.

Don Hirst, Head of Brokers and Professions at Aldermore Bank, said that the profile of asset finance customers over the last two years through the broker channel has been on larger businesses.

He cautioned that the asset finance industry and the new funders coming in to the market should set themselves up properly, and not enter to make a quick-buck by pricing down rates quickly, which may have a detrimental effect on long term real customer expectation.

Labour peer and Shadow Business Minister Lord Mitchell made a short address about his views about wanting to “fly the flag” for the asset finance industry.

He had a simple message for the NACFB brokers in relation to the major problem SMEs are facing when gaining access to funding. He said: “boys you’ve got a job to do”.

Lord Mitchell went on to describe a serious problem with how the SME sector functions. He said it was a time to “Reequip Rustic Britain” with an ever-changing world in technology and services through the internet.

He praised the peer-to-peer funding model, such as Funding Circle’s business, as one to seriously consider, and called on the brokers to look at their own processes to make sure they are ahead of the curve when it comes to technology, service and access.

Julian Rose, Head of Asset Finance at the FLA, explained how leasing and asset finance levels have been stagnant since 2005, when the industry completed around £1.2 billion of funding.

He did however highlight optimism, as last year’s FLA figures showed that members completed over £2 billion of leasing and asset finance.

He went through an alphabet soup of past government schemes and pointed out why they have been ineffective to the market. Julian noted that the schemes are getting better, indicating that the programmes are slowly being fine-tuned in the right way.

Andrew van der Lem, Deputy Director at the Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS), outlined the aims of the Government's new Business Bank programme, stating that it will be up-and-running in October 2014.

The Business Bank will be a place for all schemes, making it clearer for those businesses which require access to funding from the array of schemes available.

The first £300 million will be outlined in the Budget, however, it became apparent that there is still work to be done in helping smaller businesses.

Andrew also summarised another problem highlighted in a recent poll: 80 per cent of small business owners only think about sourcing funding three to four days before they need it.

Those that do search only take one hour to consider options and the vast majority of which still use their own high street bank.

The event was designed to give the broker, and the industry as a whole, the opportunity to come together to discuss how they might help each other to increase the availability of funding to the NACFB’s SME customers once again, and the debate heated up.

Adam Tyler said: “Whenever you have asset finance brokers you will always get a good debate and that was exemplified today.”

Marcus Grimshaw, the NACFB’s new Chairman, added: “With the attendance of Lord Mitchell and Andrew van der Lem, it is a clear sign of the direction, calibre of relationship building and lobbying we are taking at various government levels with key speakers.

“It is clear to us, now more than ever, that at the heart of a business owner’s search for finance is a professional commercial finance broker.”

What is very apparent is that there is an increasingly vast array of funders available but sadly not enough people hearing about them, despite the huge strides and progress the NACFB is making. The government, funders and brokers alike all have to start beating the drum to get people to notice that asset finance is here and it is readily available.