The small business spine of the economy is not getting the bank finance it needs and is targeting survival rather than growth, a leading adviser said.
Chris Merry, chief executive of RSM Tenon, the UK's seventh- biggest accountant and its biggest bankruptcy adviser, said in Edinburgh the Budget initiatives on SME National Insurance and corporation tax were positive. But he went on: "The challenging question which I don't think the Budget helps at all is the financing of SMEs – how do you get the banks to lend money to them?
"There are headlines and statistics around what the banks say they are doing, but the information we get when actually talking to businesses is they are finding it tough."
RSM Tenon is one of those small businesses, said Mr Merry, installed a year ago when the previous chairman and chief executive were ousted after the discovery of an embarrassing £12 million black hole in the accountant's books.
RSM admitted last month there was still "significant risk" to its banking covenants with Lloyds, which is owed £90m and has 10% of a share capital which has lost 90% of its value since 2011.
"The big things affecting us are the economy in total and what our clients are doing," Mr Merry said.
At the moment they tended to be "hoarding their cash" rather than looking outwards.
However, there had been fewer failures than expected. He said: "The market as a whole has not behaved perhaps as people would expect from previous recessions, with less businesses being put into administration – banks are behaving differently and 'zombie' businesses do not keep recovery firms occupied."
RSM is the market's only listed accountant, and has written down much of its debt-fuelled spend on growth by acquisitions. "None of our competitors have to provide the same degree of information and that has provided its challenges," Mr Merry said. On its covenants, he said: "As a public company we have to look forward 12 to 15 months as a going concern, but we have done that in the context of Lloyds being extremely supportive."
Clients, he said, had been "very positive about what we have delivered", though he admitted it was "hard to measure where we don't get on a list to pitch for new work". He added: "In the current economic background, growth is probably defined as staying much the same."
RSM Tenon has three offices and an estimated 10% of its turnover in Scotland.
Mr Merry said institutional shareholders tended to look to the future.
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