Displaying items by tag: businesses

New legislation set to replace EU rules will grant the Government and councils greater freedom to support businesses. The Subsidy Control Bill will replace EU-wide state aid rules which require member states to seek approval for government assistance to firms. Ministers said the rules will allow the Government to help companies with grants or loans faster. It has been dubbed ‘the most important bit of post-Brexit legislation yet’.

Two major business groups have written to the governments in Dublin and Belfast to urge coordination in the recovery from coronavirus. The CBI and its Irish equivalent, Ibec, said that an economic reboot will need ‘the highest level of cooperation, coordination and joined-up thinking’. They highlighted the importance of integrated supply chains across the border and Irish Sea, stopping short of requesting a synchronised exit from the lockdown. There have been political differences at Stormont on the level to which an all-island approach should be taken to coronavirus. The two groups say that it is in everyone's interests to have experts on both sides of the border regularly communicating on their respective plans for economic revival and recovery, including all-island business and cross-border employment. They add, ‘It would be helpful and worthwhile for parallel conversations to take place between the two islands, with the North-South Ministerial Council and the British-Irish council providing appropriate formal frameworks for such discussions’.