Heed the warnings coming from some of Britain's business leaders, and you'd think entrepreneurial activity was dying a death in Britain.
It was only earlier this month that CBI director-general Sir Digby Jones was accusing the government of inflicting "stifling red tape, a discredited planning regime and a society that becomes more politically correct and risk-averse by the day". The organisation branded attempts to create an "enterprise culture", whatever that means, "failed".
Meanwhile the CBI's head of economic analysis, Doug Godden, used even more apocalyptic language, telling the London Evening Standard that the government had some way to go to even create a "climate that allows the small business sector to survive".
To survive? Blimey. Things must be bad.
But what's this? Why, it's new figures from the DTI's Small Business Service, showing there were more than a quarter million firms operating at the start of last year than at the beginning of 2003 (the time lag in reporting is, they say down to delays in the reporting of business births and deaths).
But these numbers are quite significant: they show the biggest increase since such figures started being compiled back in 1995.
Impressive facts and figures from the survey included...
-- At least 95% of businesses in all industry sectors were SMEs (small to medium sized businesses) -- Most sectors are seeing growth in the number of SMEs. -- SMEs employ 43.2% of the working population, and have 49.3% of the turnover. Bigger businesses employ 55.3%, and have 43.2% of the turnover. -- 1.5% of businesses have no staff at all, but still manage 7.5% of the turnover.
You can download the Excel format spreadsheet here.
So, amid this picture of apparently robust growth and entrepreneurial activity, we need to know: are we drowning in a sticky sea of red tape or not? And, if the government talked down Britain's business climate - and entrepreneurs - in the same way as the CBI, wouldn't they be accused - by the CBI - of doing Britain down?
