APPEAL FOR JUSTICE OVER FUNDING FOR FORGE TRADERS
Businesses receive rejection letters for grants
PRESSURE is continuing to build on the Scottish Government to resolve a loophole leaving Forge Market traders without access to vital funds.
As market traders have now received official rejection letters for small business grants, MSP Annie Wells has raised the issue in Parliament while local councillor Thomas Kerr has written directly to the First Minister.
Businesses at the East End institutions have been fighting since April to have parity with other small firms entitled to receive £10,000 cash boosts.
Initially a loophole meant traders were barred from support because they pay business rates to the market owner, rather than directly to Glasgow City Council.
But the government then said it has listened to hard up businesses and changed the eligibility criteria, yet still excluded market traders.
Trader Drew Nicol meets three out of the four new criteria but is both the director and sole employee of the business so fails to meet the threshold, which includes having at least one employee.
He received rejection letter week.
He said: “I have done everything right: I pay my taxes, I pay my VAT each quarter.
“It is so hurtful to think that if I was a business on the high street then I would be entitled to the grant.
“I am managing to keep myself above water by being able to pay my suppliers and not take a wage but I know others who are totally struggling.”
Annie Wells, Glasgow the his this majority of
Scottish Conservative region MSP, said:
“Forge Market traders have been badly let down by the SNP. “They’ve been made to jump through hoops that other businesses haven’t faced, and they still haven’t received the promised funding.
“The government pretended they had sorted this issue but that’s clearly not the case and time is now starting to run out for these businesses. “They don’t need any more false promises, it’s time to actually deliver and give them the grants they deserve before they’re forced out of business. “We need the SNP remove these unnecessary hurdles at once and secure the future of the Forge.” Wells raised the issue in the Scottish Parliament on Wednesday, telling Jamie Hepburn, Minister for Business, Fair Work and Skills, traders are devastated the government has “shifted the goalposts”.
But the minister replied: “The first thing I would say is that I object to the notion that we’ve moved the goalposts.
“What we have done is we have engaged with business organisations very clearly about the need to fill a gap that existed before this former scheme.
“In relation to the different approach, this is a different cohort of businesses.
Previously it was more straightforward because businesses were registered as being eligible for the small business bonus scheme.
“Clearly in this instance that’s