The QUB study says the £136m High Street scheme, designed to boost businesses affected by coronavirus lockdowns, should have targeted businesses forced to close during the Covid-19 pandemic.

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Of the £136.5m total spend, approximately £50m was spent on stores that remained open through the lockdowns, including supermarkets, local food stores and off licences.

Everyone aged 18 and over was invited to apply for the £100 Spend Local card following its launch in late September last year. The total number of transactions was 3,713,609, with £97.94 on average used on the activated cards.

Sunday, November 14 was the busiest day, with 104,477 transactions and £4m spent.

Retail NI said the majority of the money did make its way to local independents and the scheme should be replicated in future years, but in a more targeted way..

Glyn Roberts, chief executive of the organisation, said: “It was a very, very good short term fix that kept people in jobs.”

One sector — retail, wholesale and vehicle services — dominated spend at £118m followed by £10m on accommodation and food services.

Nearly all (96%) of the £84.9m spent in businesses required to close during 2020 was accounted for by retail (£68m), accommodation and food services (£10m), and other service activities (£4m).

But the analysis reveals that £50m was spent on those businesses who remained open throughout the pandemic, almost all under the retail banner. Around 43% of the amount spent on retail alone went to companies that remained open during the lockdowns.

According to the analysis, the Belfast City Council area accounted for 20% of the total spend, or £27.6m, with £11m, or just over eight per cent, spent in the city centre.

The DfE also published the results of a survey of citizens, one carried out prior to the September 27 launch and one during its operation through to near the end of November.

According to the survey carried out after its launch, two thirds said they intended to spend or have spent all or most of the £100 in small local businesses.

Over a fifth (22%) said they intended to spend or have spent some in small local businesses and some in large multinational companies, whilst just over a tenth, 11%, said they intended to spend or have spent all or most of it in large multinational companies. Over two fifths, 44%, said they intended to spend or had spent all of the £100 on items they would have bought anyway.

Just over a fifth said they intended to spend or had spent on items they would not have bought absent the scheme.

The majority, 70%, indicated the money “freed up” other parts of their budget.

Of those, 36% said they intended to spend or had spent on items they would not have bought absent the scheme.

Over a quarter (27%) said it would go to pay bills or reducing debt.

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That was a key finding of the ‘Business Impact of the Northern Ireland High Street Scheme’ report which included a survey carried out by Retail Economics on behalf of the Department.

The research report was undertaken to assess the impact of the High Street Scheme on the retail, hospitality and service sectors and was focussed on gathering business feedback.

Its findings show that the scheme delivered against five key areas. These are:

• engagement: there was widespread engagement, with almost every single Spend Local Card activated (99.6%), with 1.4 million residents having applied for card;
• additionality: both large and small businesses reported that the pre-paid card contributed to additional spending, rather than displacing spending that was likely to have occurred anyway;
• targeting: spending was reported to have been boosted across small independent local businesses;
• confidence: the pre-paid card provided an impetus for consumers to visit physical channels which had a positive impact on footfall; and
• jobs: businesses reported that the scheme helped to safeguard jobs

From the 315 retail, hospitality and leisure businesses surveyed, the following key statistics emerged:

• 80% of retail and hospitality businesses agreed that the HSS helped support small independent businesses;
• 65% of retail and hospitality businesses thought the HSS had a positive or very positive impact on sales against their expectations for the time of year;
• 74% of small businesses thought the scheme helped boost consumer confidence and footfall over the mid-November to mid-January period;
• over two-thirds (69%) of small retailers thought that the scheme helped safeguard jobs;
• 80% of small retailers thought that the HSS encouraged spending that was otherwise unlikely to have occurred; and
• two-thirds (66%) of small businesses thought that it was a good use of public money.

Welcoming the findings, Economy Minister Gordon Lyons said: “The High Street Scheme was a novel and ambitious initiative which achieved exactly what it set out to do. Its objectives were to bring people back on to the High Street and to deliver an economic shot in the arm into our retail, hospitality and service sectors to help them recover from the devastating impact of the pandemic.

“Just under 1.4million cards were issued and over £136 million was injected into the Northern Ireland economy as a result. The research revealed by ‘Business Impact of the Northern Ireland High Street Scheme’ is further evidence of the success of the scheme in meeting these objectives.”

Reacting to ‘Business Impact of the NI High Street Scheme’ survey commissioned by the Department of the Economy, Retail NI Chief Executive Glyn Roberts said: “This survey confirms that the Spend Local card was hugely beneficial in giving a significant boost to local independent retailers and increasing footfall on our high streets.

“It is very clear that consumers heeded the call to get out and support their local independent retailers.

“As this Assembly term comes to an end, there is no doubt the Spend Local Card was one its most successful achievements. Given the current economic difficulties facing the High Street, the next Executive should give serious consideration to rerunning this scheme in 2023.”

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Economy Minister Gordon Lyons recently agreed to issue a remedy payment to the following individuals to verified applicants who did not receive their Spend Local card before the Scheme closed; and applicants who faced problems activating/using their card and as a result had a balance of £10 or more at Scheme closure. Applications must be made before 5pm on Thursday March 31.

The Department for the Economy recently emailed individuals to inform them that they, or a person they applied on behalf of, may be eligible for a remedy payment under the High Street Scheme.

A further email providing a link to the remedy payment application portal is now being issued – the bulk of emails will be sent on Friday 18 March with the remainder issuing within the next couple of weeks.

Those who wish to apply for a remedy payment (either for themselves or on someone’s behalf) should click on the link contained within the email where they will then be asked a security question in order to access the application form. Those who confirm they meet the eligibility criteria will then be asked to provide bank/building society details.

The remedy payment will be paid into the nominated account before the end of April 2022. The remedy payment made will be equal to the balance remaining on the Spend Local card at scheme closure.

E-mails will issue from noreply@spendlocalni.com and messages from this address should be treated as legitimate. Depending on the settings of a person’s email account, it is possible these emails may be filtered into a junk/spam folder, so people are asked to check these folders regularly.

Applications must be submitted before 5pm on Thursday 31 March 2022. It will not be possible to process applications beyond this date.

Those who applied via the telephone service and who have been identified as being potentially eligible for a remedy payment will receive a letter next week with details on how to apply.

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The Minister said the scheme injected at least £136.6m into the economy, leading to an improved level of consumer confidence and increased levels of public spending.

Today, the Department published a set of management information on the Scheme covering:

• number of residents issued with a card;
• number and percentage of cards activated;
• total spend;
• number of transactions and spend by Local Government District; and
• location and spend by postcode.

The Minister said: “The High Street Scheme has been a huge success and achieved exactly what it set out to do. It brought shoppers back on to the High Street and has helped and supported our local retail, hospitality and service sectors start their journey of recovery from the devastating impact of the pandemic.

“I am really pleased to announce that 1,399,051 people were issued with a Spend Local card, of which 1,393,043 – or 99.6% – were activated. This is a tremendous achievement. The scheme was designed to provide an economic boost to the local economy and to this end £136.6million has been injected into the economy.

“This can be clearly seen from the fact that nearly 1.4 million customers visited our local shops, restaurants, bars, cafés, cinemas, hairdressers across all parts of Northern Ireland during the lifetime of the Scheme and over 3.7 million new transactions were made using the Spend Local card.

“Of course, we know that many of these customers will have spent more than the £100 on their Spend Local card. So the figure – in real terms – will be greater.”

Regional breakdown

The Minister told the Assembly that the early analysis showed the benefits of the Scheme were enjoyed in all parts of Northern Ireland.

He said: “Over £27million was spent in Belfast, over £12million in Armagh, Banbridge and Craigavon while over £10million was spent in each of the following local council areas – Newry, Mourne and Down; Derry and Strabane; Antrim and Newtownabbey; Lisburn and Castlereagh; and Ards and North Down. In Mid and East Antrim, the figure was over £9million. In Causeway Coast and Glens and in Mid Ulster, more than £8million was spent, while the figure for Fermanagh and Omagh was just over £7.5million.”

MLAs heard how the scale of the task of delivering the High Street Scheme was unprecedented as, in a matter of weeks, his Department implemented a process which manufactured, dispatched and delivered cards to close to 1.4million people – each card unique to each applicant, including bespoke embossed cards for the visually impaired and blind.

The Minister told MLAs: “The effort was worth it. I am sure that Members will have heard the same positive messages that I have heard from businesses, but it has also been confirmed by independent analysis.”

According to an Ulster Bank Survey, retail sales in Northern Ireland rose in November 2021 for the first time in four months. The bank’s Chief Economist Richard Ramsey said the High Street Scheme undoubtedly contributed to the pick-up in demand.

Research in December 2021 also showed an increase in shoppers on Northern Ireland’s high streets. The figures published by the Northern Ireland Retail Consortium (NIRC) showed a boost to the number of people going into shops or businesses in October continuing in November following the introduction of the High Street Scheme. In November, the number of shoppers in Northern Ireland reached their highest point so far compared to the pre-pandemic level.

The Minister said: “The people from which I was most pleased to hear were the business owners who needed the scheme to help them cope with the impact of the pandemic. On a personal level, these individuals – shopkeepers, barbers, newsagents, publicans, café owners, the list goes on – brought it home to me why this scheme was so important.”

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