Study aims to find out how Covid-19 has hit rural firms
RURAL and farming businesses in the Midlands are being asked how they are dealing with Covid to explore the lesser-known area of rural resilience.
There is little research about how small firms in rural areas manage crises and how they recover so the National Innovation Centre for Rural Enterprise (NICRE) is speaking to more than 4,000 businesses over the next two months to shed light on this area.
The survey – NICRE’S first – asks businesses about the strategies they have put in place during the pandemic to increase their resilience and their plans and expectations for the future.
Professor Stephen Roper, NICRE co-director, said: “Every business in the UK has been challenged in some way over the last year due to Covid however those in rural areas have been some of the hardest hit.
“As we take steps along the road to recovery, it’s surprising, perhaps, but we have very little robust information on rural resilience - how small firms in the countryside deal with crises and how they recover.
“We would be very interested to talk in-depth to the owners of rural and farming firms about how you and your business have coped during the pandemic, the challenges you have faced, and what you think about the support you have received from Government and local agencies.
Alongside resilience, the survey explores how firms’ local networks have contributed to survival and growth, the impact of financial pressures on businesses, families and communities as well as issues around workforce, the availability of broadband, and aspects of local supply chains.
Any business interested in giving their views should contact Prof Roper at Stephen.roper@wbs.ac.uk
HIGH street giants returned to ultralow deposit mortgage lending yesterday, in a boost to borrowers, including those in Burton and South Derbyshire, who have found themselves “shut out” of the property market over the past year.
Halifax, Lloyds Bank, HSBC UK, Barclays and Natwest were among those launching 5% deposit deals for first-time buyers and existing home owners under the Government’s new mortgage guarantee scheme.
Santander will offer three new mortgages under the scheme today. Virgin Money will follow next month.
Katie Brain, a banking expert at financial information business Defaqto, said: “When the pandemic started, all the mortgage deals for first-time buyers and those with small deposits just disappeared.
“Many who had saved hard for a deposit found themselves unable to get finance and were effectively shut out from the property market.
“Although there have been a few products that been briefly available during the pandemic, this is the first time that we have seen mainstream lenders in the high LTV (loan-tovalue) market in nearly a year.”
Borrowers will still need to pass affordability checks.
They will also need to check individual lenders’ policies to find out more about whether they could be eligible, with several lenders setting out exclusions for new-build homes on Monday.
Some lenders also specified that self-employed customers will be able to apply for their deals.
Aspiring home owners may also want to compare what is on offer under the scheme with the low deposit deals that are available outside it.
Finance experts highlighted a fiveyear deal from Coventry Building Society at 3.89% with a £999 fee, which is not in the mortgage guarantee scheme. Defaqto said that, within the scheme, Natwest’s offering of a two-year deal at 3.90% with no fee, and its five-year deal at 4.04% without a fee, are particularly competitive.
The number of low deposit mortgages on the market shrank dramatically in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, a s lenders became