New figures from the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) show that, at start-up stage,  almost a third of small businesses have difficulty finding suitably skilled staff.

Respondents to the FSB’s latest Voice of Small Business Survey also said that they found regulation requirements onerous (47 per cent), had been affected by a lack of services offering business advice (38 per cent) and had difficulty securing finance at start-up (34 per cent).

The figures come as the FSB is launching an inquiry with Iain Duncan Smith, Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, into entrepreneurship to see how these barriers can be removed.

With 95 per cent of private sector businesses employing less than 20 members of staff, the inquiry will look at how these firms can be encouraged to take on staff and how budding entrepreneurs can be supported in setting up their own business against a backdrop of uncertain economic times.

The FSB is calling on the Government to:

• Reinstate the graduate internship scheme to give graduates the opportunity to acquire the skills they need for starting and running a business 
• Prioritise enterprise education by putting it in the statutory curriculum 
• Take on the Independent Commission on Banking’s recommendations to create more competition in the banking sector 
• Extending work trials to the first day someone signs on to Jobseeker’s Allowance to help create 46,000 more jobs 
• Reduce the flow of regulation and tackle the stock of existing regulations.

EfC thinks this is another example of where organisations could be missing out on a talented, experienced group of people. If businesses were to advertise flexible jobs they are likely to attract highly skilled carers who want to combine paid work with their caring responsibilities.