Lord Sugar, Mr Wright, Political Rhetoric and a 'Nice Little War'

A new task force was launched today by the Department for Business . The task force will be advising the Government as to how to ensure that small companies are treated fairly and properly when trying to access bank finance.

The task force will be made up of Lord Sugar, John Wright (the outgoing Chairman of the Federation of Small Business , and former Lloyd's TSB Deputy Chief Executive, Mike Fairey.

That should be interesting.

Five months ago Mr Wright called for Lord Sugar's resignation. That was when Lord Sugar described struggling companies as "moaners" living in "Disney World", and told a business audience that eighty-five per cent of the small businesses applying for bank loans were more in need of a bankruptcy adviser and added: "I can honestly say a lot of problems you hear from people who are moaning are from companies I wouldn't lend a penny to."

Mr. Wright and Lord Sugar are now said to be "on good terms" - but there's already a political row brewing that could soon become what used to be called 'a nice little war'. Richard Lambert, the Director General of the Confederation of British Industry , described the proposal as "dotty" and declared "it will never see the light of day, is quite unworkable and pure political rhetoric."

Lord Mandleson was quite cross about that, but I won't bore you with his comments. You've heard them all so many times before that you could probably recite them in your sleep.

Going back to Mr. Lambert's comments:

I'm not sure about "dotty", given that, according to research carried out by Graydon UK and the Forum of Private Business one in five SMEs have been refused funding and do not know why their bank rejected their loan application.

I'm not sure about "unworkable" either, because I think the task force could work.

Unfortunately, I am quite sure about the "pure political rhetoric" - and that's what's going to make this task force "potty" and its task "unworkable".