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The industry body representing the asset finance sector, the Finance and Leasing Association, said its members "seek to put the customer first" and they "recognise that SME owners face a raft of daily pressures".

“If the SME sector is not supported, it is going to go extinct,” says Mr Rickard, pointing out that the previous government spent billions on the Help to Buy scheme, where it effectively gave first-time buyers cash grants at the point of purchase.

Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch said almost every job in the UK was owed to "what is, or what previously was, an SME", describing them as the "engines of economic growth".

"Over the past weeks, several foreign diplomats ask me - aren't you crying wolf too early?" said Beata Balogova, editor-in-chief of the daily newspaper SME.

"I absolutely don't understand this. Zsuzsova found guilty, Kocner innocent," Kuciak's father, Jozef Kuciak, said on SME's live broadcast outside the court.