Cheap loans won’t be enough to save the thousands of businesses that have been starved of revenue for the last six weeks, National’s Economic Development and Small Business spokesperson Todd McClay says.

“Today’s announcement is too little and risks being too late. It’s not targeted enough and all they are doing is taking the debt that’s been accumulated over the past six weeks and moving it sideways.

“What businesses need now is direct cash flow grants not cheap debt so that when we finally leave these heavy lockdown-like conditions, they can get up and running again quickly.

“The loan scheme criteria is also overly restrictive. All businesses should be viewed as viable because they have been forced to close through no fault of their own and with little time to prepare.

“Every business that stays open means more jobs are kept.

“Australia provided instant cash flow grants to businesses across the ditch which has allowed many to keep operating.

“Tourism, hospitality and retail have been shut down for six weeks and they won’t have any certainty about when they can open for another week.

“The longer this goes on, the more businesses will fall over and more jobs will be lost. Businesses need direct cash flow now.

“We’ve flattened the curve, we don’t need to flatten the economy.”

© Scoop Media