“Hello I’m Cllr Mike Evemy and, as well as being the Deputy Leader of Cotswold District Council, I’m the Cabinet member for Finance. That means that I’m responsible for how the council manages its finances, administers grants and runs revenues and benefits. With COVID-19 taking over our lives right now, I’d like to reassure local businesses that council officers are hard at work getting the government grants out to you.
In this edition of the newsletter you will find some more information about how this is happening. Please know that your council is here for you and will continue to support you during this time, a situation none of us has experienced before. We want to make it through this together.”
Business grants are on their way
The Government funding schemes for the small businesses and the retail, hospitality and leisure grants are now live. The Government has committed to the automatic and immediate payment of these grants without businesses being required to apply.
However, we do still need some very basic information in order to make the payments and have created a simple form that businesses need to complete. We have written to all eligible businesses with this form but we have also made it available to download from our website to help speed things up. If your business meets the eligibility criteria, please complete the form and return it to our dedicated email address revenues@cotswold.gov.uk. Any delay in providing this information could lead to a delay in payment so please return it promptly.
We will process the grant as quickly as possible and expect payments to be dispatched by Friday 10 April where you have provided us with the information. During this time our team will be exceptionally busy and it would be helpful if you could refer to our website for updates and, apart from submitting the form, only contact us by email if really urgent.
The council will not be collecting any business rates payments by direct debit during April 2020 to help ease business cashflow concerns. Instead, this payment will be deferred until all appropriate reliefs and grants have been applied. For those businesses that pay their business rates from April to January, this change will mean that payment instalments will move from May to February. The deferral will take place automatically - no action is required from businesses.
Guidance on the Job Retention Scheme
Detailed guidance about claiming reimbursement for workers' wages through the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme has been published. As a reminder, this is the scheme that will pay 80% of wages up to £2,500 per month. This applies to employees who have been asked to stop working, but who are being kept on the pay roll, otherwise described as ‘furloughed workers’.
The scheme will be administered by HMRC and it is expected to be available by the end of April 2020. Businesses with immediate cashflow issues should get support from the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme.
For local businesses with any questions at this difficult time the GFirst LEP can provide expert advice and support via their Growth Hub. They are encouraging businesses based in Gloucestershire to complete their COVID-19 survey which asks about the impact on your business.
The Arts Council has announced a £160 million emergency response package to support individuals and organisations across the cultural sector in response to the Covid-19 crisis. The package announced comprises:
£90 million for for National Portfolio Organisations (NPOs)
£50 million for organisations outside of the National Portfolio
£20 million for creative practitioners and cultural workers
There is further detail of these emergency funds on the Arts Council's website.
Please forward this email to others to whom this might be useful and encourage them to sign up to further updates. Please note that you can access previous editions of this newsletter too.
Our council Coronavirus web pages have updates about business support, communities and leisure, bins and recycling, elections and council meetings, planning, building and council news.
We hope you found this newsletter useful. We would like them to be as relevant as possible so please let us know what you think and don’t forget to send us your news to press@cotswold.gov.uk
“Hello I’m Cllr Mike Evemy and, as well as being the Deputy Leader of Cotswold District Council, I’m the Cabinet member for Finance. That means that I’m responsible for how the council manages its finances, administers grants and runs revenues and benefits. With COVID-19 taking over our lives right now, I’d like to reassure local businesses that council officers are hard at work getting the government grants out to you.
