good afternoon today I can announce the
next step in the economic fight against
the corona virus pandemic with new
support for the self-employed our
step-by-step action plan is aiming to
slow the spread of corona virus so fewer
people need hospital treatment at any
one time protecting the NHS s ability to
cope at every point we have followed
expert advice to be controlled in our
actions taking the right measures at the
right time we are taking unprecedented
action to increase NHS capacity by
increasing the number of beds key staff
and life-saving equipment on the
frontline to give people the care they
need that is why it is absolutely
critical that people follow our
instructions to stay at home so that we
can protect the NHS and save lives our
action plan to beat this pandemic is the
right thing to do but we know that
people are worrying about their jobs and
their incomes working closely with
businesses and trade unions we have put
together a coherent coordinated and
comprehensive economic plan a plan which
is already starting to make a difference
big employers like BrewDog dimpsons and
prep have already said that our
coronavirus jobs retention scheme means
they will protect thousands of jobs and
we are publishing this evening detailed
guidance on how the scheme will operate
so that other businesses can protect
jobs to small businesses are already
benefiting from the coronavirus business
interruption loans of up to 5 million
pounds which are interest-free for 12
months with 30,000 inquiries in just
four days
local authorities are already informing
over 700
thousand retail hospitality and leisure
businesses that they will pay no
business rates this year and the new
hardship grant scheme providing cash
grants of up to twenty five thousand
pounds for the smallest businesses is
now up and running so if any business is
struggling and worrying they may need to
new staff I would urge you to log on to
business support gov dot UK and look
very carefully at what support is
available before deciding to lay people
off I'm proud of what we've done so far
but I know that many self-employed
people are deeply anxious about the
support available for them musicians and
sound engineers plumbers and
electricians taxi drivers and driving
instructors hairdressers and child
minders and many others through no fault
of their own risk losing their
livelihood to you I say this you have
not been forgotten we will not let you
behind we all stand together so to
support those who work for themselves
today I'm announcing a new self-employed
income support scheme the government
will pay self-employed people who have
been adversely affected by the
coronavirus a taxable grant worth eighty
percent of their average monthly profits
over the last three years up to two
thousand five hundred pounds a month
this scheme will be open to people
across the UK for at least three months
and I will extend it for longer if
necessary you'll be able to claim these
grants and continue to do business and
we're covering the same amount of income
for a self-employed person as we offer
further employees who also receive a
grant worth eighty percent that's unlike
almost any other country and makes our
scheme one of the most generous in the
world providing such unprecedented
support for self-employed people
has been difficult to do in practice and
the self-employed are a diverse
population with some people earning
significant profits so I've taken steps
to make this theme deliverable and fair
to make sure that the scheme provides
targeted support for those most in need
it will be open to anyone with trading
profits of up to 50,000 pounds to make
sure only the genuinely self-employed
benefit it will be available to people
who make the majority of their income
from self-employment and to minimize
fraud only those who are already in
self-employment who have a tax return
for 2019 will be able to apply
ninety-five percent of people who are
majority self-employed will benefit from
this scheme HMRC are working on this
urgently and expect people to be able to
access the scheme no later than the
beginning of June if you're eligible
HMRC will contact you directly ask you
to fill out a simple online form then
pay the grant straight into your bank
account and to make sure no one who
needs it misses out on support we have
decided to allow anyone who missed the
filing deadline in January four weeks
from today to submit their tax return
but when don't many self-employed people
are struggling right now so we've made
sure that support is available
self-employed people can access the
business interruption loans
self-assessment income tax payments that
were due in July can be deferred to the
end of January next year and we've also
changed the welfare system so that
self-employed people can now access
universal credit in full a self-employed
person with a non working partner and
two children living in the social rented
sector can receive welfare support of up
to eighteen hundred pounds a month the
scheme I've announced today is fair it
is targeted at those who need it the
most and crucially it is deliverable and
it provides an unprecedented
level of support for self-employed
people as we've developed the scheme I'm
grateful for the conversations I've had
with the Federation of small businesses
the association of independent
professionals and the self-employed and
a range of trade unions including the
Trades Union Congress but I must be
honest and point out that in devising
the scheme in response to many calls for
support it is now much harder to justify
the inconsistent contributions between
people of different employment statuses
if we all want to benefit equally from
state support we must all pay in equally
in future these last 10 days have shaken
our country and economy as never before
in the last two weeks we have put aside
ideology and orthodoxy to mobilize the
full power and resources of the British
state we have done so in the pursuit of
a single goal to protect people's health
and economic security by supporting
public services like our NHS backing
businesses and protecting people's jobs
and incomes what we have done will I
believe stand as one of the most
significant economic interventions at
any point in the history of the British
state and by any government anywhere in
the world we have pledged that whatever
the resources the NHS needs it look at
promise to pay 80% of the wages of
further workers for three months up to
2,500 pounds deferred more than 30
billion pounds of tax payments until the
end of the year agreed nearly
17-thousand time to pay arrangements
with businesses and individuals made
available three hundred and thirty three
billion pounds of loans and guarantees
introduced cash grants of up to
twenty-five thousand pounds for small
business properties cover the cost of
statutory sick pay the small
medium-sized businesses for up to two
weeks per employee lifted the incomes of
over four million households with a
nearly seven billion pound boost to our
welfare system agree that three-month
mortgage holiday with lenders and nearly
a billion pounds more support for
renters through the local housing
allowance and today we've announced one
of the most generous self-employed
support schemes anywhere in the world
despite these extraordinary steps there
will be challenging times ahead we will
not be able to protect every single job
or save every single business but I am
confident that the measures we have put
in place will support millions of
families businesses and self-employed
people to get through this get through
it together and emerge on the other side
both stronger and more United thank you
I think if we can take some questions
from the media turning first to from the
BBC you've said you hope to cover nearly
all of the self-employed but what about
people who this scheme does not cover
and when do you hope the mayor will
start coming through and if I may we've
been really inundated with worries from
people who feel they're not safe at work
we had a message from someone saying
their employer was forcing people they
said everyone knows it's wrong that we
are being emotionally blackmailed by
bosses saying you don't come to work
people will lose their jobs as the
Chancellor what do you say to employers
who have floating the rules like that
and to the deputy cm oh if I mean when
do you now expect the peak of the virus
to be from the most up-to-date
information you have please thanks Laura
to your first question this team if you
look at people who make the majority of
their earnings from self-employment this
team will cover 95% of them of the
people that it does not cover that last
5% those above the income threshold
is that their average incomes are about
200,000 pounds so we think what we've
done is reasonable proportionate and
fair as their covers 95% of all
self-employed people who make the
majority of their earnings from
self-employment so I think is it it's a
very generous scheme in that regard and
treats them with the same parity that we
did for employed in terms of the timing
our expectation is that this will be up
and running by the beginning of June we
will look to try and do it faster than
that but I don't want to promise
something that we can't deliver today as
I said before this is operationally
complicated
we are already designing brand-new
schemes to cover the 90% of the
population that are employed here we
need to design another scheme on top of
that and we also want to give now four
weeks for people who haven't filed their
tax return yet from January an
opportunity to do so to benefit from the
scheme and I think that was a trade-off
that was worth making giving people that
little bit of extra time now those late
filers to Jenny to answer your second
question around workplace guidance so I
think on the workplace guidance it's
really important that employers most of
whom have been extraordinarily
supportive I think of their employees
stick to the normal principles of
workplace health we've made it very
clear I think what those principles are
if people can work from home they should
be able to if they can't there may be a
dap tations that they can do in the
workplace and we've also made it clear
what sorts of distances and practical
measures can be made to ensure people
are safe so in some ways although we're
being more specific about the public
health requirements in the middle
this outbreak actually the same
principles about workplace safety apply
and I know the Health and Safety
Executive were reminding workplaces of
that today earlier and on the issue of
the deepika in the epidemic I'm sure you
will not be surprised to know that I am
NOT going to predict to precise timing
for that and the reason for that is we
are only just starting to see a bite if
you like in the interventions the social
distancing that have been put into place
it would be far too early to predict
that I think we are starting to see some
helpful movement let's put it that way
and what we will be looking for is a
change in the slope rather than being a
very steep curve upwards we will be
looking for it to be a gentler slope but
we must not take off it of the pedal
people have been really cooperative and
I think in the last few days the public
have really understood that this is
something very serious and their actions
wherever they are will save lives so too
early to say yet but I think it's
starting to move in the right direction
thank you could turn next to better it
be from Sky Scheme a big scheme that you
can't get the money and some dude in
telling people that they can't apply the
universal credit but there's a fight we
went for the first payment
can you guarantee to people watching
this who are in immediate and desperate
need that if they apply for universal
credit that they will get an advance
payment in 10 days or less to tide them
over and question if I may to the deputy
CMO how many NHS staff are currently
unable to work because they are unwell
or self isolates and it's obviously an
area thank you Beth to your question
about people's and media cash flow needs
to which will cause were enormous be
sympathetic to we've got a couple of
things with regard to universal credit
first and making it just
accessible particularly for those who
are self-employed and more generous in
that regard overall in terms of the
measures I've already announced but in
terms of speed it is already the case
and the department working pictures
focus on this people can get an advance
payment it almost immediately after the
claim so they do not have to wait for
the five weeks an advance payment can be
given almost immediately certainly
within days that's very much what they
are already doing on top of that we have
deployed extra resources into the
authorities particularly to help those
who are most vulnerable with things like
their council tax bill which many
families is a very large bill that they
face every month and so local
authorities now are in receipt of the
extra money we've given them and they
can work in their own communities to
identify those most vulnerable families
that you've talked about a little bit
difficult I don't have the precise
figure with me this afternoon in
relation to and it's just stopping but
I'm sure my NHS colleagues would do and
I think the important thing is - I do
recognize that there are a significant
number of staff who are absolutely doing
the right thing as the rest of the
public are in taking themselves out of
the work force if they are symptomatic
and maintaining the safety for the rest
of the public but particularly the
vulnerable patients and I think we have
to recognize and support that and the
two things we have been doing to try and
improve that as we go forward that is
the right thing to do but we can help
everybody I think number one to be clear
on what the workplace guidance is and
there are some very helpful guidance
through the NHS but for particularly for
people with in the vulnerable group if
you like with underlying conditions I
think some people have interpreted that
if their health in well that have an
underline
conditioned as perhaps needing to stay
right out of workforce but for some of
those people it will be appropriate for
them to work but on an individual
discussion with their workplace and then
I think the other issue obviously is I
know you'll be aware we are trying to
push forward on our testing program but
right at the top of that list are the ha
spare workers and our care workers more
generally and different our responses
for example in police under their first
line response systems and that's because
we recognize that knowing whether people
have had the disease or not brings
people back into the workplace now but
it also means we know what our
resilience is going forward as we move
into the depths really of the epidemic
so it's it's for all of us to do that
and that's what we're trying to do thank
you so next to a Robert Peston from ITV
afternoon so what about many people
who've only recently entered the
workforce might not have three years
over counts not even one year of
accounts how can they get help
secondly how long do you expect this
scheme to run for do you have an
estimated cost for per month of the
scheme and finally did I hear you right
when we're through this you intend to
equalize tax and national insurance
between employment and self-employment
essentially as a sort of form of natural
justice it's they're all being bailed
out all of us are being bailed out on
the same basis and then finally the
deputy C hello quickly said yesterday
the big problem in terms of ramping up
testing is a world shortage of the bits
weeks ago
hey Robert what was your first question
exactly cut out for a second
oh sorry so the first question is
significant numbers of people so what we
will do is for those that don't have
three years we will look at whatever
they do have whether it's one two or
three but things we're looking at
trading profits apart share profits
obviously those can be volatile year to
year so where people do have more than
one year we will look to average out
over the years that was something that
many people call for because it's a
sensible thing to do for people who we
don't know anything about that there is
really nothing we can do and that's one
of the complicated things we've been
wrestling with we are I think most
people accept that we have to use the
database of people we know about and the
file tax returns that's the population
that we have that I talk to those are
for tax returns in January 31st of this
year all the late filers which will give
full week to for those who are very
recently self-employed we do we cannot
operate a scheme like this there is just
too much complexity both operationally
and fraud risk with that so we would
have to say to those people please look
at the extra support we've put into the
welfare system to help you at this time
but as I said this covers the four spots
majority of people in terms of the time
frame for the scheme what we've said is
and now that gets to the employed scheme
we would do this for three months so
obviously if we are able to make
payments to people at the beginning of
June they would receive three months
payments at one time back dated to March
completely comparable to the employee
and we've got you a question on tax I
think the broader point I would make is
rather than be too specific right now
a future tax policy is just an
observation that there is currently an
inconsistency in contributions between
self-employed and employees and
obviously the actions taken today which
is very significant tens of billions of
pounds of support for those who are
self-employed tweeting them the same way
as those who are employed it does just
throw it in like that question of
inconsistency and whether that is fair
to everybody going forward especially
especially as we look when we get
through this and we're all chipping in
together to right the ship afterwards
making sure I think that's a very fair
and reasonable observation to make at
this time thank you in relation to
testing so I think with all of the
things whether it be testing or PPA we
have ordered and we have planned ahead
but I think what the public perhaps will
recognize is that this is a brand-new
event it's a pandemic and every single
country is ordering at the same time
many of the reagents and the items that
they use are coming from some simple
suppliers but many from international
suppliers many of whom have actually
been affected themselves by the pandemic
so I think this is not an issue of a
lack of forethought in planning it is an
unprecedented event and I think a few
other points which are worthwhile
thinking about it is a brand new virus
so even to understand how you might test
it you need to have the virus and
understand a little bit about it before
you can start and there is also a point
which is really important
whilst we are dealing with coronavirus
so colleagues in public health England
for example on the day-to-day basis
still need to manage all the other
individual infections which are in the
country and some of those will be of
higher significance a higher risk for
individual people so it should be wrong
for us to be moving for example stock
from our daily work into this I mean on
a final point and I think the chief
medical officer made the point yesterday
the evaluation of this is absolutely
critical so we do have evaluations
running now and I recognize we all want
to see these testing programs very
active we have a test we want to do we
have Jason Jason - your first special on
timing previously we looked very hard at
the quickest possible way to deliver
this we are already delivering a brand
new system to deal with the employment
scheme that we've set up which covers
90% of the population and that will be
up and running by the end of April to
ensure that those businesses you know
can meet their payroll that April them
and use that scheme to pay their further
workers it is ultimately the same group
of people the same systems that need to
do this so we can do some of it parallel
that some of it will have to be a
sequence they come afterwards also
because we've taken the decision to
allow people who are linked in filing
their tax returns in January four weeks
from today
the opportunity to file their tax
returns and benefit from this scheme
that also will have some
on time in which again I think is a
reasonable and sensible trade-off to
make in the circumstances they will get
three months in one go in June which
obviously will be welcomed and as I said
we have made available multiple other
avenues of support in the interim for
this population of people very
considerable investments both in the
welfare system through local councils
and other tax deferrals and with regard
to thing again I'm not anticipating
future policy I'm just making the
observation that I think it is harder to
sustain the argument that if you're
employed and paying a higher rate of tax
on the basis that you are treated
differently and now we're treating
everybody the same and a very very
significant cost that we as a country
and as a society as we get through this
and all together are figuring out once
we get through this how we how we then
right the ship afterwards you know this
is an observation that I think is
eminently fair to make now at this point
and then we can discuss in the future
you know how best we will come together
to get through this and I set to right
the ship and make sure that we get
everything back on track again okay
thank you yes I I mean I personally and
many of my year public health colleagues
have made it very clear that we
recognize that there are potential
mental health risks as well that we need
to be looking after our bodies and our
minds at the same time that particularly
applies to our very high-risk vulnerable
group who we have asked to almost take
themselves out of society for 12 weeks
that's a really big ask and it's why in
the letters which have gone out to them
there are specific links and suggestions
around mental health and mental health
welfare linking with every my matters
all sorts of links to do that but I
might actually put a more optimistic
view as well which is if people are not
going out to work and often that
actually
creates quite a stress in terms of
travel time they have more free time to
themselves and it might be the best
opportunity the whole country has to say
I'm going to use my one exercise session
every day to ensure that by the time
this is over I am super fit and so as my
family and in fact if you have something
restricted it suddenly becomes quite a
pleasurable event so even though you may
not have wished to jog along the street
before doing so now might actually be
quite quite a relief and quite a
positive thing that was all to do thank
you George Parker from the FT ok
Chancellor you've made no secret at all
about the schemes been very difficult to
design would you accept that it's open
to abuse for example people claiming the
money and then basically sitting at home
what would you say to people thinking of
potentially abusing the system a second
one a number of medium-sized companies
have been in touch with us to say that
the Bank of England global scheme isn't
working for them because they don't have
an investment grade what can you do to
help those companies in this so-called
squeeze and the questions of the ECMO
but don't think we ever really had a
public explanation why this country
decided to stop testing George thank you
on your first question first about the
scheme we love designing these things at
Pace identify given the circumstances I
don't think we should let the perfect be
the enemy of the good we accept that has
some challenges that's why we put some
of the conditionality into this ear to
limit some of the risks that you
identified for example making this for
people who have an actual tax return
that we can look
so we know that there are real people
who are genuinely self-employed and not
just telling us out of the blue that
they are that's kind of very obvious
check there will be a forum that people
will have to fill in we will contact
them because we can identify them
ourselves who we think should be
eligible we will ask them to apply and
check a few other boxes just to confirm
to your point that they are still
trading and some other things which we
can then later verify as well so we will
be able to actually put in place some
sensible compliance measures in that
regard to your to your second point and
that's a very excellent point that we've
obviously put in place a bunch of
different loan guarantee schemes to
provide credit to corporate UK there was
an issue with the commercial paper
facility that we had originally set up
with the Bank of England if it was for
people who had an investment grade
rating there are perfectly good private
companies that are credit worthy but
don't have that rating what we have done
is work with the Bank of England to find
a workaround for that so that we can
impute a credit rating from the
company's individual relationships with
their banks and that way construct a
rating but we think that will
significantly increase the addressable
number of companies that can now benefit
from that scheme the details of that are
even have been about to be published
Bank of England for working with us
constructively on that and what it will
mean is that between the coronavirus
business interruption loan scheme at the
bottom end the companies up to forty
five million pounds of turnover and the
commercial paper facility on the top end
we will now be covering eighty percent
of UK employment and eighty percent of
corporate UK turnover with those two
schemes that still does leave a small 20
percent gap in the middle we are finding
ways to try and address that gap as well
obviously that's a little bit more
challenging because by definition of
those companies are not as credit worthy
and this is taxpayer money we're putting
on the line and so we need to make sure
that there is some way that we are
protected in that regard but I think now
that we haven't improved
commercial paper scheme we've got 80% of
employees and corporate revenue covered
and there's a small gap that we all have
to be working on to find some creative
solutions for so I think I'm going to
answer in two different sections so the
first one about the WHI comments so I
think the comment you were picking up
with dr. shredder or saying test test
test
but in fact we need to realise that the
clue for whu-oh is in its title it's a
World Health Organization and it is
addressing all countries across the
world with entirely different health
infrastructures and particularly public
health infrastructures we have extremely
well developed public health system in
this country and in fact public health
teams actually train and others abroad
we have supported w-h-o through their go
on process and some of our
epidemiologists have gone out to Manila
for example to support the early
response in that area so the point there
is that they are addressing every
country including low and middle income
countries so encouraging all countries
to test awesome typing when you come to
the UK we have made it very very clear
there has been a plan right the way
through this which is entirely
consistent with the science and
epidemiology we started with a
containment phase and every early case
of this disease was followed through
every contact was traced exactly as we
would do for other diseases but
particularly noticing this one and of
course you're the viewers will be very
familiar with the fact that we had some
very strict and very successful
containment facilities but there comes a
point in a pandemic
that is not an appropriate intervention
and that is the point really where we
moved we moved into delay and although
we still do do some contact tracing and
testing for example in high-risk areas
like prisons or care homes that is not
an appropriate mechanism as we go
forward at that point what we need to do
is focus on the clinical management of
the patients first and foremost and then
additionally as I've said earlier on our
health and care staff from first
responder staff
so obviously actually if there is
infinite testing facilities and we are
growing them at pace and we will have
them then it moves to the public but we
need to be very careful about focusing
where it's clinically most valuable
I'm sorry we can't hear you yes we can
now Charles when you look at the US
unemployment figures from today and the
number of people claiming universal
women here does it make you concerned
that the cube could be worse than the
virus and secondly the deputy CEO most
previously suggested the lockdown could
continue on and off for six months are
you concerned that the economy could be
destroyed by then and a quick question
for the deputy CMO public health England
1 million members of the public demands
result set self testing kits at home who
will these people be how will you choose
them and what will happen and then
obviously I I have seen the numbers both
from the US and indeed here and you know
of course they're very they're very
worrying these are people's livelihoods
their jobs their financial security
which is is now been severely damaged
I'm very cognizant of that that's why we
have acted I think an incredible speed
to put together a number of different
packages of support to protect people's
jobs and incomes and provide them with
financial security what is going through
what is going to be a very challenging
few weeks and months there's no two ways
about that but we are taking the advice
from our medical and scientific advisers
it is the right strategy where we make
the right decisions at the right time to
protect people's lives but also control
the spread of this virus to a level
where we can cope with it which then
allows us from a position of strength to
decide how best to manage things from
that point forward but absolutely
knowledge this is going to be
challenging people's lives in economic
lobby that's all going to be impacted
but I do believe the measures of support
that we've put in place will make
enormous difference to helping to
alleviate some of that hardship and I
think to your potentially has taken out
of the context in the sense that what I
was saying well as we may see measures
of lockdown going forward over the next
six months that would not be an
implausible outcome but I also said I
think that as we're watching the curve
it may be possible definitely not now
because we're only just starting to get
to some benefit from this but we may be
possible to start moving that so the
issue here is about exactly as we have
done all the way through this is about
keeping watching the epidemiology and
flexing those interventions at the right
time in the right place to deliver what
we need and obviously I think the whole
country and myself included will will
want to be back to normal as soon as we
can so I think mentioning a six-month
it's to give a a general look forward
about the sorts of lengths of this type
of pandemic but we have to remember also
that we have if we are successful we are
lessening the spike on the curve and we
are pushing it forward so a success in
some ways means pushing it forward but
not necessarily with the strengths and
interventions that we have at the moment
all the way through so that would be the
first point and I don't precisely
recognize the other quote that you were
talking about in relation to public
health England but I think there are two
points probably one is we will want to
understand very quickly the wave the
disease has traveled around the country
and through different elements of our
population so it may be that that quote
was in relation to work which will
almost certainly go forward in due
course understanding with the
proportionate sample of support
nation who has had the disease and who
has not and that will give us a strong
clue as to when we know when the
outbreak may end completely so it's
about understanding through different
age groups and different vulnerable
groups what has happened which you
cannot do consistently for absolutely
everybody a whole population in the
middle of an outbreak but I think in
relation to other testing and who gets
it and who doesn't I think I've probably
answered that with the earlier one the
absolute point here is it is clinical
benefit it is the people who are going
into hospital into our intensive care
units with acute respiratory distress
syndrome and pneumonia the same into the
wards and then those high-risk areas and
then on to our health care workers thank
you thank you
we're out of time so just in conclusion
if I could say you know today was about
providing reassurance to the millions of
people who are self-employed and and are
anxious about their security and their
livelihoods I think like any
international standard the package that
we have outlined today represents one of
the most generous meant comprehensive
ways to support those in self-employment
anywhere in the world and I would
conclude by saying this to all of those
who are self-employed who were rightly
anxious and worried about the next few
months you haven't been forgotten we
will not leave you behind
and we are all in this together thank
you