Will the Leader agree
to review the Discretionary business support grant criteria, to
bring it in line with other local councils that allow for hackney
and private hire drivers that do not live within South Cambs, but
are Licensed within the District, to qualify for support providing
they have not received a grant from another Local Authority?
Councillor Peter
McDonald, Lead Cabinet Member for Business Recovery and Skills,
responded as follows.
- We have been and
continue to support South Cambridgeshire based Taxi firms including
private hire and chauffeur via our hardship discretionary scheme
(ARG – Additional Restrictions Grant funding).
- Sole Trader Taxi
Drivers resident in and licensed in South Cambs (who have also been
in receipt of Self Employment Income Support Scheme, SEISS) are
each receiving a discretionary payment of £500 from us
– a higher value one off payment than issued by many local
authorities, including Cambridge City.
- We are awarding
higher value ARG payments to those in most need, depending on the
specifics noted in their application forms to us, for example, if
they are based in the District, not in receipt of SEISS and/or are
themselves Taxi firm owners/Ltd companies and can demonstrate in
excess of 40% loss of sales and lack of financial support from
elsewhere, we are awarding significantly higher value payments in
those specific circumstances.
- We are not able to
support Taxi Drivers licensed in South Cambridgeshire but who are
not resident in South Cambridgeshire as this would
disproportionately prioritise Taxi Drivers as a sector within our
overall ARG pot i.e. we could be paying out up to 17% of our total
ARG pot to taxi drivers alone on that basis when we have a need to
provide support across many sectors as equitably as
possible.
- Currently, based on
our rule of paying out a £500 flat fee to those licensed and
resident in South Cambs (if they are in receipt of SEISS), we will
still potentially be paying out c.10% of our ARG fund to Taxi
Drivers if the majority of South Cambs resident drivers do apply as
we expect. This 10% is an appropriate level of support for this
group.
- Many Taxi Drivers
have licenses across multiple districts and may be receiving
several payments from different neighbouring authorities.
Formalising the need to be both resident and licensed in the area
in which one is applying for a grant mitigates some of that
complexity and duplicative payment structure. It essentially
minimises the danger of recipients capitalising on multiple
payments from multiple authorities.
- Furthermore, ARG
funding was very clearly allocated on the basis
of a “£20 per head of population”
allocation (ONS 2019 mid- year population estimates). On that
basis, we must prioritise businesses based in (registered address
in) South Cambridgeshire.
Councillor Graham Cone
asked, as a supplementary question, whether there could have been
collaboration with neighbouring councils to see who had claimed or
not yet done so, in order to prevent people slipping through the
net.
Councillor Peter
McDonald agreed this was a fair point. However, the volume of work,
involving over 200 requests per day sometimes, and processing of 50
to 60 grant applications per week. The approach taken was therefore
considered to be a fair and equitable one.