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DTI attacks CBI's Business Link report

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Today's Telegraph reports that furious Department of Trade and Industry officials have slammed the CBI for publishing what they see as a poorly researched report criticising the Business Link advisory service.

Officials are particularly incensed by the trade body's questioning of the DTI's own performance statistics and its use of a "dated and questionable" survey on customer satisfaction that they say does not reflect improvements made to the service.

They are also annoyed by the CBI's decision to ignore the rapid rise in popularity of the new Business Link website, which was used by 5.5m people last year.

The CBI report, released last month, argued that the £140m-a-year service, run since April by the nine Regional Development Agencies, was failing to deliver with only 14pc of firms using it and only 38pc of those saying they were satisfied with the help they received.

"Unless there are significant delivery improvements which feed through to businesses across the UK, calls for a more radical overhaul of the system will grow," it said.

Read the full story at The Telegraph

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Posted March 1, 2006
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