FOI release

FOI2021/00034: Subsidy Control

Some or all of the information requested was not provided because we determined that the cost to do so would exceed the appropriate limit.

Case reference FOI2021/00034

Published 23 June 2021

Request

Request Received: 25 January 2021

I am requesting under the Freedom of Information act the following, to aid with my understanding of the current process for assessing and determining an organisations considered in financial difficulty during the due diligence period of application assessment pertaining to Innovate UK led competitions.

With the update of the Subsidy control, under-takings-in-difficulty is lost as a definition, and instead replaced with "financial difficulty".

Please can you supply the following to advance the very useful information supplied within FOI2020/00308:

1) A detailed step-by-step description of the process decision pathway followed by the employee/representative performing the Subsidy control financial tests of the organisation.

2) The updated decision flow chart (or equivalent) including trigger points for Subsidy financial testing, and the request parameters for further information

3) The updated training documentation provided to IUK employees for performing Subsidy control testing.

4) Any updates to the IUK SOP "Policy - Undertaking in Difficulty (UID)" since 10 Nov 2020; or its equivalent replacement SOP if it has been since superseded.

5) If there are no changes to the above process further than that outlined within FOI2020/00308, any internal email communications pertaining to the time frame of development of a new/updated Due Diligence process(es).

What I am looking for information on is with the withdrawal bill in place; the changes that this will bring to the IUK due diligence process, in the near - medium term.

Internal email communications of Innovate UK, from 31.5.20 to present should capture this time frame.

In terms of keywords, happy to be guided on here, my thoughts would be along the lines of:

Replacement to current UID process

Changes to the due diligence process

State Aid

State Aid Assessment

Subsidy Control

Requirements / terms and conditions

Response

Response Sent: 11 March 2021

Full details of this response are provided in the attached document.

Documents

• FOI_Response_Letter_FOI2021_00034_Redacted.pdf (171.1 KB)

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