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ºÚÁÏÍøÕ¾ Borough Council has paid a total of £11.7m in grants to more than 800 businesses affected by coronavirus – and is launching its Discretionary Business Grants for eligible small and micro businesses on Monday.

The £11.7m given out equates to 97 per cent of the funding received from the government – one of the highest rates in the country. This was made up of Small Business Grants of £10,000 and Retail, Hospitality and Leisure Grants of £10,000 or £25,000.

The council has now received a much smaller funding allocation from the government of £612,750 for Discretionary Business Grants, which are aimed at eligible small and micro-businesses in ºÚÁÏÍøÕ¾.

These businesses can start applying to the council for a grant from Monday (1 June) until Sunday 14 June. This will provide further grant funding for a limited number of additional micro and small businesses. A micro or small business has fewer than 50 employees.

The government’s intention is that the Discretionary Business Grants benefit small and micro businesses who have not benefited to date from other government business support programmes set up in response to the coronavirus crisis. These include the Small Business Grant and Retail, Hospitality and Leisure grant schemes and businesses in receipt of one of these grants are therefore not eligible to apply.

In view of the very limited amount of funding, the council particularly welcomes and will seek to prioritise applications from small / micro businesses that applied to the above schemes but were unsuccessful. In addition, the council welcomes applications from small / micro businesses faced with high property costs and the risk of significant income, jobs and business losses as a result of the crisis.

It is likely that there will be great demand for these grants and that the scheme will be heavily oversubscribed. Only a small minority of business applicants are likely to be successful in securing grant funding from this particular scheme. For those applicants that are successful the council will ensure that grant payments are made as quickly as possible, subject to due diligence checks.

Further information on the Discretionary Grants Fund and an application form can be found on the from Monday.