MORE than 3,000 businesses in Dumfries and Galloway have received £34m from the Scottish government’s business support programme.
The council has been receiving about 70 applications a day and has paid 77 per cent of applications within 10 days.
The self-employed hardship fund launched on April 30 and the council has received 168 applications and paid £196,000 to approved applications.
The council is working in partnership with the South of Scotland Enterprise (SOSE) and Scottish Borders Council.
Councillor Elaine Murray, council leader, said: “We recognised early on in the current pandemic that, if were to emerge from the situation with a healthy economy, we needed to do as much as we could to support our businesses through it.
“We set up our economic recovery team as a priority and it has worked hard to ensure we do all we can to mitigate the financial effects on companies.”
Businesses in Scotland have received £100m through the government’s business support fund.
More than 2,500 businesses and 4,160 self-employed people have been helped. The fund is now being expanded.
Small B&Bs, previously ineligible for other support because of not having a business bank account, can apply for a share of £3m of funding which has been repurposed from the newly self-employed hardship fund, which remains open.
It will be administered by councils and applications open on June 15.
The pivotal enterprise resilience fund and the creative, tourism and hospitality enterprises hardship fund are now closed.
Go to FindBusinessSupport.gov.scot for information on funding.
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