Welcome for £1.7m pandemic aid for town centres and rural businesses

Upper Bann MLA John O’Dowd said: “This is a welcome boost for our town centres and rural businesses in helping them to recover from what has been a very difficult year.

“The additional funding will be used to provide further support for schemes managed by local Councils, with £1.4m from DfC going towards grants in the larger urban towns and £300,000 from DAERA providing similar business support in smaller rural settlements.

“This additional funding brings the total investment and support for our town centres and rural businesses to over £19 million.

“This grant will assist businesses, shops, retailers and workers to ensure their premises are safe and secure to tackle the pandemic.

Mr O’Dowd said: “There were many businesses disappointed in the first tranche of funding and I will be lobbying the Council to assist those businesses in securing much needed funding this time round.”

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After months of terrorising staff, an NI council is to hire security firm for community centre Read full story here-

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