The extension to the Self-Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS), however, comes amid criticism from the business sector that the scheme itself is too limited in who it supports.
The National Chairman of the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) Mike Cherry said though the government had responded to calls for more support, many self-employed people are still not covered by the scheme.
“We have sadly already seen 250,000 self-employed people stop working and become economically inactive, a figure which is set to continue rising,” he added.
Otherwise, he said, “the impact of the extension will be minimal.”
“The first lockdown drastically undermined self-employed incomes, and the gaps in government support led to the biggest drop in self-employed numbers on record,” he said.
The criticism comes following Prime Minister Boris Johnson telling Parliament on Monday that he was “truly sorry for the anguish” businesses that had just “got back on their feet” would suffer due to new national restrictions set to start on Thursday.
“We’ve already paid out £13.7 billion [$17.7 billion] to help the self-employed and I can announce today that for November we will double our support from 40 to 80 percent of trading profits,” he added.
The government said that the November enhancement for the self-employed paralleled the extended support to employees under the furlough scheme for the same month.
The two three-month grants for the self-employed will be extended from 40 percent to 55 percent of trading profits and be capped at a total of £5,160 ($6,700), it said.
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