NO local businesses should be allowed to fail because because they cannot get credit, the Treasury Minister said yesterday.

Senator Philip Ozouf (pictured) made the pledge after announcing that States reserves would be made available to fund a multi-million-pound rescue package for the Island’s faltering economy.

However, he warned that the rescue scheme would not be ‘a blank cheque to pay for new ventures’. And he said that pay-outs would have to go hand in hand with public-sector cutbacks, which would require States employees to be ‘reasonable’ in their pay demands.

In a prepared statement read to the States after the lunchtime recess yesterday, the minister was asked by Deputy Daniel Wimberley whether the scheme would help smaller businesses. Senator Ozouf said: ‘It is absolutely right that small and medium-sized businesses will receive all the attention and assistance necessary. I do not want to see any businesses failing just because they do not have
access to appropriate credit. No decent businesses should fail just because they cannot get credit.’