Strasbourg, 24/10/2012 (Agence Europe) - The European Parliament says that the member states should turn their fine words of support for small businesses into action for the 21 million or so small and medium-sized companies that are the backbone of the European economy by giving them better access to finance, slashing red tape and encouraging entrepreneurship and internationalisation.
Adopted by the EP plenary on Tuesday 23 October, a report by Paul Rübig (EPP, Austria) sets out measures to be taken as a matter of urgency to support small businesses. In order to encourage them to do business beyond the EU's borders (which only 13% of European small businesses do at present), the report recommends that the EU set up a multilingual website with information about key markets overseas. It calls for a much greater reduction in red tape in measurable stages. To encourage entrepreneurship, it recommends better incentives and business conditions for women and young people and awareness-raising of business ideas among young children. The report calls for an Erasmus-type programme for young entrepreneurs and wants greater attention to be paid to small traders with tangible action like increasing the budget for the COSME programme in the 2014-2020 EU budget to make small businesses more competitive, and speedier introduction of the late payments directive. The Parliament also wants new rules to reduce the time it takes to obtain loans of less than €25,000 to less than 15 days. (EH/transl.fl)