Significant cash top-up is a boost for our businesses
Here in Strathearn – in common with the whole of mainland Scotland – we are now in a lockdown very similar to the one we endured just under a year ago.
This includes a legal requirement to stay at home except for essential purposes as the new variant of Covid-19 proves itself to be considerably more transmissable than the original strain.
And when you consider that the ease with which this virus can be transmitted from one person to another was one of the reasons for the first lockdown, the threat it poses is easy to see for us all
These restrictions affect all of us but I know that there are sectors of the local economy that are particularly hard hit and I was pleased to hear this week, from Scottish Government Finance Secretary Kate Forbes, of a significant top-up to the grant support available for hospitality, retail and leisure businesses.
In addition to the grants many receive through the Strategic Business Framework Fund, eligible businesses will also get a one-off grant ranging from £6000 to £25,000 on top of the four-weekly payments they are already getting.
In most cases, eligible businesses that have already applied for the four-weekly payment from the Strategic Framework Business Fund will get an automatic top-up.
For the majority, this top-up will be combined with the next tranche of payment for the Strategic Framework Business Fund due to go to businesses on January 25.
Businesses that haven’t yet applied for either of these funds should submit an application as soon as possible through the council’s website.
There is, of course, one huge difference between this lockdown and the last.
We now have a number of different vaccines available and it is in these vaccines that we must put our hope for bringing this virus under control.
Since Christmas, the vaccines and the virus have been in a race.
But this is a race in which we are more than just spectators cheering on from the sidelines.
We can, all of us, affect the outcome. On the one hand, we can help to slow down the spread of the virus and we do that by following, as closely as we possibly can, all of the advice and guidance that is coming to us from government – both in the spirit and the letter of the law.
Every time we look for a loophole in the rules we open up a space the virus can get through.
Meanwhile, the Scottish Government is doing everything it can to vaccinate the population as quickly as possible, working through the list of priority groups.
For those of us not actively involved in the vaccination programme, there is still one thing that we can do to help in this part of the race – and that is to step up and get our jags as soon as they become available to us.