Today sees the opening of the Bluebell tearoom on the First Floor of Wilkies in King Street
With a bright and airy design overlooking the Crawford Arcade, the tearoom celebrates the best of Traditional Scottish tea rooms. With bone china table service, the tearoom offers a selection of tea, coffee, light meals and home baking throughout the day. The tearoom is operated by Lisa Sneddon. Full details can be found at
www.bluebelltearoom.com
The Bank of England has published the minutes to the meeting of the Monetary Policy Committe, which announced in early Augustthat base interest rate was to remain unchanged at 0.5%
Further information can be found at the banks website here
The minutes of the monetary policy committee which sets the rate, can be found here
If you know of someone who might benefit from a £40,000 injection to their innovative green business,
the deadline for Shell Springboard is 5pm on the 5th November.
Shell is looking for: UK-based small to medium size enterprise
The business idea or technology has to be:
Commercially viable
Innovative
Carbon Saving
Applications should be made online before 5pm on the 5th November 2010
More information about the award and how to apply for one of eight awards of £40,000 on offer this yeat, can be found at http://www.shellspringboard.org/
Source: Sustainable Scotland
http://www.sustainablescotland.com/
From April 1 2010 tens of thousands of small businesses will continue to pay no rates at all under the Scottish Government's small business bonus scheme.
You could save up to almost £4,100 year, depending on your rateable value. An eligible business property will save on average £1,440 in 2010-11.
What's the catch?
There isn't one! The Scottish Government wants to help genuinely small businesses, particularly in the current economic climate.
Who qualifies?
You may qualify if you pay non-domestic rates for properties with a combined rateable value of £25,000 or less.
The savings band for eligible properties are -
Combined Rateable value of all business properties in Scotland
Percentage relief available
Up to £10,000
100%
£10,001 to £12,000
50%
£12,001 to £18,000
25%
Upper limit for cumulative (RV) * £25,000 25%
* The Scheme has been expanded in 2010-11, to allow a business with 2 or more properties with a cumulative rateable value of £25,000 or less to qualify for relief of 25% on individual properties with rateable values of up to £18,000.
Interested? - How to apply
If you are currently in receipt of the Small Business Bonus and your circumstances have not changed you should not need to re-apply, however if you are in any doubt you should contact the local authority.
If you think you may now be eligible, you must apply for the bonus Scheme. For an application form please click here
The simple application form will only take a few minutes to complete and you only need supply the name of the business, the address and the rateable value - it could be the easiest £4,100 you make this year.
When calling your local authority ask to speak to the revenue or non-domestic rates section and ask for a Small Business Bonus Scheme application form. Many local authorities also have forms available to download online.
Your local authority can also advise about eligibility if you have more than one business property and interaction with other non-domestic rate reliefs.
Find out more
For more information and advice please contact Stirling Council.
RE: eco-innovation 2010
The European Commission today launched a €35 million call for eco-innovation projects to be funded under the Competitiveness and Innovation Programme. Under the 2010 CIP Eco-innovation call for proposals, funds are available for new projects in the area of materials recycling, sustainable building products, the food and drink sector and green business practices. Applications are particularly welcome from small businesses with green products or services that need backing to penetrate markets. The call opens today and runs until 9 September 2010. Some 50 projects could end up being chosen for funding.
More details and how to apply can be found at this site: http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/10/420&format=HTML
Application can be found here: http://ec.europa.eu/environment/eco-innovation/application_en.htm
Source: EUROPA website
http://europa.eu/index_en.htm
