SMALL businesses will receive government help to compete with big firms – including access to advice, finance and large-scale public-sector contracts – if Labour comes to power, the party will pledge today.

Labour intends to set up a new “one-stop shop” for small business to be called the business development agency (BDA), as part of a 20-point plan to boost small firms and Britain’s ailing high streets.

Shadow business secretary Rebecca Long-Bailey said  that small businesses are being “stretched to breaking point by global corporations which evade taxes and fail to pay suppliers on time.”

She said: “This inequality scars our country. Small businesses are vital to a thriving economy.

“Labour wants business support and finance to be available for entrepreneurs from the moment the seed of an idea is planted.”

Current support for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) was likened to a “patchwork” by the Federation of Small Businesses.

Labour said that the BDA would address gaps in the support system, with a network of business advisers in larger branches of the new Post Bank already planned by the party.

These hybrids of post offices and banks would offer SMEs start-up and business development loans.

A central online portal, similar to the Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman and the US’s Small Business Administration, would also be established.

Like the US equivalent, the BDA will also help small businesses to win government contracts. 

Additional pledges in the plan include cracking down on late payments that damage smaller businesses and providing free full-fibre broadband to all business premises.

Labour also vowed to scrap quarterly reporting for firms with a turnover of under £85,000, and to reform the “outdated” business rates system through a switch to annual valuations and other measures.