Banks must help small businesses

Business Secretary Lord Mandelson has met bank bosses to discuss what help they can give to the country's struggling small businesses. He held talks at the Treasury earlier with Chancellor Alistair Darling and the chief executives of leading banks. Speaking outside the meeting, Lord Mandelson promised to help "tease out the problems" small firms were having with bank loan arrangements. He said: "What we clearly need to do, given the concerns amongst small businesses and the tensions there, is to create a forum to bring them together. "The Government is going to do that in the next couple of weeks so that where there are issues about availability of lending and curbs on lending we can thrash these out and tease out the problems. "There is a willingness to make sure that we get through these very difficult times together." He continued: "The banks don't want to pull the plug unnecessarily on small businesses. They want to help where they can but the banks at the same time are facing difficult conditions of their own. "The Government can play a role in securing better understanding of the issues between smaller businesses and the banks and that's what we are going to do."

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ITN | October 23, 2008