To ask the Minister for the Economy whether he will extend the deadline for the High Street Scheme to ensure that everyone that wishes to apply can have their application processed in time.

To offer all applicants a fair timescale in which to use their Spend Local Prepaid card, I announced on 2 November that I was extending the deadline for applicants to use their Spend Local Prepaid card by two weeks from 30 November to 14 December. This means that the vast majority of people will have at least four weeks to use their card. I have no plans to extend the spending period further.

We have also taken the necessary steps to update procedures to avoid any unnecessary delay in approving the manual applications which have been necessary to ensure the validity of some applications.