AQW 19729/17-22

Ms Claire Sugden
Independent
East Londonderry

Tabled Date: 01/06/2021
Answered On Date: 09/06/2021
Priority Written: No

Question:
To ask the Minister of Finance what measures of previous years’ business were used to formulate the amount given to holiday rental accommodation owners and operators when determining their Localised Restrictions Support Scheme grant.

Answer:

The Localised Restriction Support Scheme (LRSS) was established to provide financial support to certain businesses which were required to close or severely limit operations at their premises under the Health Protection Regulations that have been put in place by the Executive.

Three levels of financial support were provided under the LRSS, depending on based on the Net Annual Valuation (NAV) of the property. The NAV of the property was used as a proxy measure of the size of the business since larger businesses typically occupy larger premises. The weekly payment amounts of £800, £1,200 and £1,600 were agreed by the Executive for all types of business. This approach was adopted as it was straightforward to administer and allowed the support to be paid quickly to the businesses that needed it.

Measures of previous years’ business were not used to determine the amount of support for holiday rental accommodation businesses, or indeed any other kind of business. Tailoring the amount of support paid to individual businesses on the basis of turnover in prior years would have been administratively complex and time consuming, would have delayed the release of the funding and would have excluded newly formed businesses from the support.