Figures paint better business picture

Nationally there were 20,164 business failures for the period January to June 2001, exactly 100 less than the same period last year, or a 0.5% decrease.

Areas like the South East and South West saw the number of failures fall between 7% and 9% with Wales made the strongest recovery registering a drop in failures of almost 16%.

Other parts of the country were less well off with business failures growing between 4% and 7% in Scotland and the West Midlands respectively, while the North East recorded increases of more than 10%. London remained largely unchanged, with a slight increase of just 1.9%.

But quarterly figures supplied by Dun & Bradstreet suggest business failures are set to rise in the coming months after total failures rose by 15% quarter-on-quarter across for all regions, except London.

Philip Mellor, a senior analyst at D&B said the rise was partly due to a drop in tourism from the foot-and-mouth epidemic.

‘There is evidence that business failures in the South West and North West of the country – the regions most affected – increased significantly during the second quarter of the year,’ he said.

Smaller companies once again made up lion’s share of failures, with the number of larger companies closing up shop, continuing to decline.

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