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British Business Bank’s Growth Guarantee Scheme provided with additional capacity to support businesses affected by global tariff changes.

Press release 13 April 2025

  • Extra funding to enable lenders to provide around £500m of additional finance for smaller businesses
  • Businesses should contact a participating lender to apply for lending of up to £2m

Announced by the Chancellor today, the Growth Guarantee Scheme will provide approximately £500m of additional lending capacity to help more smaller businesses across the UK. The extra funding is aimed at smaller businesses that may need support with cashflow issues due to changes in global tariff rates.

Delivered by the British Business Bank through around 50 accredited lenders, the Growth Guarantee Scheme has so far enabled £2.1bn of finance through 13,447 facilities 1 .

The Growth Guarantee Scheme can generally support facility sizes of up to £2m and provides the lender with a 70% government-backed guarantee, helping lenders to support viable smaller businesses. The additional capacity is being provided to support around £500m of extra lending, targeted toward smaller UK businesses affected by the changes to global tariff rates.

Businesses can use the finance for any legitimate business purpose, including managing cashflow or working capital requirements due to disruption caused by changes to global tariffs. However, businesses must be able to afford to take out additional debt finance for these purposes.

Scheme features

The Growth Guarantee Scheme aims to improve the terms on offer to borrowers. If a lender can offer a commercial facility on better terms, they will do so.

Key features include:

  • Up to £2m per business group: The maximum amount of a facility provided under the scheme is generally £2m per business group for borrowers outside the scope of the Northern Ireland Protocol, and up to £1m per business group for Northern Ireland Protocol borrowers.
  • Wide range of products: The Growth Guarantee Scheme supports a broad range of finance solutions. The additional capacity for the scheme is intended to support term loans, overdrafts and other products that help support cashflow challenges. Not all lenders will be able to offer all products.
  • Pricing: Interest rates and fees charged by lenders will vary and will depend on the specific lending proposal. The lender’s pricing will take into account the benefit of the Government guarantee and a fee that is charged to the lender for the guarantee
  • Guarantee is to the lender: The scheme provides the lender with a 70% government-backed guarantee against the outstanding balance of the facility after it has completed its normal recovery process. The borrower always remains 100% liable for the debt
  • Decision-making delegated to the lender: Growth Guarantee Scheme -backed facilities are provided at the discretion of the lender. Lenders are required to undertake their standard credit and fraud checks for all applicants.

How to apply

The Growth Guarantee Scheme is available through the British Business Bank’s accredited lenders and partners, which are listed on the British Business Bank website.

In the first instance, businesses should approach their own provider – ideally via the lender’s website. They may also consider approaching other lenders if they are unable to access the finance they need.

Reinald de Monchy, Co-Chief Banking Officer, British Business Bank, said

The Growth Guarantee Scheme and its predecessors have proven themselves to be an important means of supporting smaller UK businesses over the last forty years. The Growth Guarantee Scheme can be used counter-cyclically, enabling smaller businesses to obtain funding during times of uncertainty such as we are experiencing currently. It is therefore important and necessary to see additional capacity made available to support smaller UK businesses at this time.

At Autumn Budget 2024, the government confirmed over £1bn of funding for the British Business Bank to continue its programmes throughout 2025/26, supporting access to finance for smaller UK businesses, and helping to drive economic growth across the UK. This included additional support for smaller housebuilders through the ENABLE Build programme, allocated funding for the Growth Guarantee Scheme, funding for Start Up Loans, additional funding for three equity programmes supporting innovative, high growth businesses including tailored support for companies in life sciences.

Further Information

If you are a journalist and have a media enquiry, please contact [email protected].

Notes to editors

About the British Business Bank

The British Business Bank is the UK government’s economic development bank. Established in November 2014, its mission is to drive sustainable growth and prosperity across the UK and to enable the transition to a net zero economy, by improving access to finance for smaller businesses. Its remit is to design, deliver and efficiently manage UK-wide smaller business access to finance programmes for the UK government.

The British Business Bank’s core programmes support over £17.4bn 2  of finance to almost 64,000 3  smaller businesses.

As well as increasing the supply and diversity of finance for UK smaller businesses through its programmes, the Bank works to raise awareness of finance options available to smaller businesses. The British Business Bank Finance Hub provides independent and impartial information to businesses about finance options, featuring short films, expert guides, checklists and articles from finance providers to help make their application a success.

The British Business Bank is also responsible for administering the government’s three Coronavirus loan schemes and its Future Fund, together responsible for delivering £80.4bn in finance to 1.67m businesses. These schemes are now closed to new applications.

British Business Bank plc is a public limited company registered in England and Wales, registration number 08616013, registered office at Steel City House, West Street, Sheffield, S1 2GQ. Wholly owned by HM government, the Bank and its subsidiaries are not banking institutions and do not operate as such. They are not authorised or regulated by the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) or the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). BBB Patient Capital Advisory Services Limited is an appointed representative of Langham Hall Fund Management LLP, which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority of the UK.

A complete legal structure chart for the group and details of each subsidiary and the programme(s) it operates (where applicable) can be found at british-business-bank.co.uk.

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