East Cambridgeshire District Council has taken action to assist small businesses during the Coronavirus pandemic.

The Council has responded to the roll out of the Government small business grant and has contacted all eligible businesses in the area with information about what they need to do, more than 1,000 businesses in total.  

The first grant payments were made last week to get support to people quickly during this difficult time.

The small business grant funding of £10,000 is available for all businesses in receipt of small business rate relief or rural business rate relief.

Councillor David Brown, Chairman of the Finance and Assets Committee said:

“The Government has acted quickly to make this funding available and we have done the same to make sure that our small businesses get the funding they need as quickly as possible.

“It is crucial that businesses keep going through this time as we want to be sure they can hit the ground running when things get back to normal, our local economy depends on it.”

Councillor Anna Bailey, Leader of East Cambridgeshire District Council, said:

“Our priority during this time is to make sure that our local businesses survive this extreme situation.  We are in unprecedented times and the Council is doing everything in its power to support our local businesses through this pandemic."

Business owners can check their eligibility on the East Cambridgeshire District Council dedicated COVID-19 business support page

East Cambridgeshire District Council has also been working with Anglia Revenue Partnership on the Business Rates discount scheme which will be applied automatically for all eligible businesses, as well as to identify businesses that are eligible for the Retail, Hospitality and Leisure grant; it began ontacting eligible businesses from the 6th April.  For more information about the financial support for businesses, visit the East Cambs COVID-19 business support page.