You will have seen the nationally published roadmap for easing restrictions. We want to work with businesses through this period, and beyond, to make sure you’ve got the right support to meet these next challenges. Building on the experiences from last year’s reopening, and feedback from our recent engagement, we are looking at a number of new support schemes we could offer.
These include:
- Grants to any customer facing business, to meet specific costs of Covid-safe adaptions or changes to business to keep trading during the period
- Shop front improvement scheme, to help meet the costs of external improvements to shops
- Online support and guidance to any business needing help with Covid-safe practice, or business testing
- Fast-track system for licencing changes for expansion of trade outdoors
- Grants to support digitisation and improvements in digital offer for businesses
- A light-touch scheme to help show customers where businesses are operating in a Covid-safe manner
- Investments in new Covid-safe facilities like hand sanitisers in shopping areas, as well as a visible positive presence of Covid Support Officers on the streets
- Comms campaign to support benefit of supporting local business
- These schemes would be in addition to the support recently announced nationally, with new grants likely to be available within the next few weeks as part of the governments ‘Restart’ package.
Before we finalise any plans, though, we wanted to make sure we had an opportunity to engage you. To ask what you actually need, an to check how useful you would find this support. To aid that we’ve created a very short survey, with opportunity to add in your own comments.