Aberta NDP Calls on Province to step up for small businesses struggling to pay back Ceba loans— Gurinder Brar MLA ,

CALGARY (Times Bureau ) : The Alberta NDP stands together with small business owners calling for the UCP government to step up with support for small businesses struggling to pay their Ceba loans.
Currently, Alberta businesses with outstanding Canada Emergency Business Account (CEBA) loans have less than five months to pay back up to $40,000 dollars to meet the December 31st deadline. If not, these businesses will lose up to $20,000 dollars that could have been forgiven by the federal government under the terms of the agreement.
“As Ottawa continues to ignore the calls from thousands of business owners, it is on Danielle Smith to step up. Today, we call on the UCP government to leverage ATB Financial to provide low-interest loans to active businesses struggling to pay their CEBA loans,” said Gurinder Brar, Alberta NDP critic for Small Businesses.
In Alberta, there are roughly 100,000 small businesses employing more than one million Albertans contributing immensely to our economic growth. The CFIB reports that the average Alberta small business still carries $85,000 to $100,000 worth of pandemic-related debt. “Helping businesses with a low-interest loan to help repay CEBA loans is not just helping businesses get back to ‘business as usual’, but will actually help keep their business operating, potentially growing their business and investing more in their products and their staff,” said Brar.
In Alberta, 125,015 businesses were approved for CEBA loans at a total cost of $6.8 billion.
“We fear that if we are not able to pay $40,000 by the end of this year, we will also have to pay back the additional forgiveness amount of $20,000, which will only result in us being in more debt and eventually shut down our businesses,” said Navdeep Brar, a small business owner in Calgary.
“We, as small business owners, are looking up to the provincial government to step in with some supportive solution, one like MLA Brar has offered today, which might act as a sigh of relief to keep our businesses and livelihoods alive,” said Jagraj Singh Sohi, owner of JD’s Flooring & Decor World in Calgary. “We request all levels of governments to understand the ground reality and come forward to support us, as we do not want to shut down our businesses,” said Sukhbans Jakhu, heating and plumbing business owner.