Central Beds Council give out over £8 million in ARG Covid grants
Thousands of businesses have had grants paid to them through the pandemic
Over 5,000 businesses in Central Bedfordshire have benefited from support grants.
Central Bedfordshire Council has paid close to £8.4m in Additional Restrictions Grant (ARG) payments to local businesses.
The top-up payments have been made to over 850 businesses who previously received an Additional Restrictions Grant (ARG) 1, 2 or 3.
To date, Central Bedfordshire has paid out over £80 million in grants in over 11,000 separate grant payments to more than 5,000 businesses since March 2020 when the pandemic began.
Sovereign Partners Ltd is one of those businesses, and founder Barbara says they were needed:
"These grants and loans were the difference between surviving and being able to getting going now and closing the company. That would have just been terrible we have been going in the UK for nearly 30 years.
"We started with about 35 staff members and now we have closer to 25, some moved on but we did have to make some redundancies. These grants really helped us keep the people who have the experience and the business knowledge so that now things are opening up we can get going.
"It has been difficult but the communication from Central Bedfordshire Council has been great and our contact Sue there has been so helpful."
Now that all funding has been distributed, the Council can access further business support funding from the Government in the coming months.
Executive Member for Corporate Resources, Councillor David Shelvey, said:
"We are delighted to have spent our full funding allocation from the Government to be able to further support local businesses. We are working on a new scheme for July that will recognise more sectors eligible to access financial support. This summer is key for businesses reopening as they navigate a new normal.”
Details on a new business grants scheme will be published on our website in July.