Public Services (Social Enterprise and Social Value) Bill

We must also not differentiate between a business being local and being big. It would be dangerous if we equated local with small. As a member of the all-party group on small business, I was a guest yesterday evening at an event at which one of the ““Dragons””, Theo Paphitis, spoke powerfully about the impact of his chain of shops, Ryman. He took the group on when there were about 80 shops, and there are now about 260. He encourages local staff at each store to raise money for local community projects and he then matches it. Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be dangerous if we started defining too narrowly the scope of even the businesses with which we want to engage? Local does not necessarily mean small, although as someone who has run a small local business, I fully emphasise the importance of what small businesses bring to local community life.