Annual Survey of Small Businesses: UK 2005

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) make a vital contribution to the overall healthof the UK economy and to improving the productivity of UK business. Thegovernment has a clear vision - to make the UK the best place in the world to start and grow a business. It wants:

• many more people, regardless of their background, to have the desire, skills and opportunity to start a successful business
• everyone with the ambition to grow their business to be helped and supported
• a supportive business environment, with all SMEs finding it easy to respond to government and to access its services.

It is the task of the Small Business Service (SBS), as an agency of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), to work with the rest of government to deliver this vision.

In 2003 and 2004, SBS completed an annual survey of the experiences andopinions of the owners of SMEs, which built on its earlier Omnibus Survey of SMEs.This document is the report of the third, 2005 sweep of the new survey. The survey seeks to:

• monitor the needs of SMEs, assess their main concerns, and identify the barriers which prevent them from fulfilling their potential
• act as a sounding board for possible government actions to help SMEs
• record SMEs' expectations of government business support.