The UK government has announced it has exceeded its target to spend at least a quarter of Whitehall’s procurement budget on SMEs.

In the last financial year, central government has allocated 27.1 per cent of its procurement budget to SMEs, amounting to a total of £12.1bn spent and surpassing the 25 per cent promised in the last parliament. The announcement was made by his Rt Hon Matt Hancock MP from the Cabinet Office.

The target has since been raised to 33 per cent of Whitehall’s procurement budget by the end of parliament, which the Cabinet Office is confident will be achieved.

According to Mr Hancock, “Small businesses are the lifeblood of the UK economy”. Hence, the government wants to “turbocharge [our] ambitions for small business and have £1 in every £3 of government spend going to small businesses by 2020.”

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