Speeches by McDougall.

“The issue around VAT is one that is often discussed. I would say a couple of things on the idea that there is a company foregoing growth before that £90,000 threshold. First of all—again, I am slightly treading on Treasury Ministers’ toes here—”

“Yes, of course. Targets should always be a floor rather than a ceiling in terms of our ambitions.”

“As I say, it is slightly an inevitable thing of being the Minister responsible for small business. We have to work with a lot of other Departments. The matter of targets that are set will be for Treasury Ministers. Again, I would just say that there is an extraordinary amount of investment going in to try to deal with …”

“I would say that the vast majority of small businesses are desperately keen to pay what they owe, and it is, at times, far too difficult for them to do that. It is also bad news for Government, because about 60% of the tax gap relates to small businesses.”

“This would be a matter for Treasury Ministers. What I would say is that £500 million is being put into HMRC at the moment to improve that. A huge and important part of that will be moving from about three-quarters of interactions with HMRC happening in the digital space at the moment to 90% in the future. That is happe…”

“No, of course not.”

“That is still shy of the 85% target, but, when you consider that we inherited 66% of those calls being answered, it does show progress.”

“No, it is not. I have been the small business person on the phone, and it is incredibly frustrating when you simply do not have enough time in the day to run your business at the best of times. The FSB reckons that small businesses spend about 44 hours and £4,500 a year on dealing with HMRC. What I would say is that, i…”

“I saw that story too. Sometimes when you see stories in the press, you can work out what their provenance was. On that one, I simply could not. There is a real determination in Government, evidenced by the fact that the Prime Minister was there for the launch and was so enthusiastic around the proposals that we have fo…”

“I will not abuse my position. What I would say in terms of the code is that we have replaced the prompt payment code with the fair payment code. That is more than just a name change. Under the new code, you have to get the gold standard, silver standard or bronze standard of payment practices. You have to give more evi…”

“No, they are not, which is why we are consulting on this at the moment. As the Chair said, the enormous cost to the economy of about £11 billion from late payments is only part of the story. 133 million hours of staff time are spent chasing late payments. I mentioned this job being cathartic at times. I go back to roug…”

“I would have to get back to you on that.”

“We are asking Government Departments to set their targets.”

“As I said, this is partly about publishing the targets and reporting on them every year, so there is an element of transparency here. Again, as with the defence example, it is being collaborative and working with them on this, and trying to change the understanding of procurement and what value for money looks like in …”

“No, I do not think so. This is work that is led by the MOD. There is a genuine desire to get better at this running all the way across Government. The other thing that I would say is that, if you read the national procurement policy statement, small business runs through that like writing in a stick of rock. It goes al…”

“I will take the example of colleagues in defence, which is a Department that historically was the largest buyer in Government but often had relationships with very large customers rather than small business. They are aware that there is a particular historic issue with that. We work with them on their small business pr…”

“We have the three-year target for spend by Departments and non-departmental public bodies. Alongside that, they have to set out SME action plans for how they are going to make it easier for them as well. As Small Business Minister, I view my job as to be a constant advocate for small business across Government. I will …”

“The Procurement Act seeks to deal with that historic failure to open up procurement to SMEs. It does many important things. It removes some of those particularly egregious barriers, such as having to have insurance before you bid, the pre-qualification questionnaire or the requirement for audited accounts. Those things…”

“Yes, those are the ones that I am most excited for and feel a sense of urgency around.”

“On procurement, we inherited a 33% target. As you say, that was not being met—it was down at 20%—and it was going backwards. We were spending less on SMEs than we were five years before. It is about trying to make a step change in the culture within Government and the ability of SMEs to take advantage of what for them …”