BANKS were last week urged to up their lending to small businesses.
The call came from the Forum of Private Business after data on the Project Merlin lending agreement was released.
Although the ‘big four’ banks were found to have hit their overall lending targets, they fell short on a pledge to lend £6 billion to SMEs by £.1bn. “They [banks] need to reach out further to business and repair the damaged relationship with firms who are essentially their core customers,” said FPB chief executive Phil Orford.
