Richard Kirtley, Jun 05, 2026
There is a particular kind of frustration that comes from reading a report and finding yourself nodding almost all the way through it.
Not because the report is especially surprising, nor because it has uncovered some hidden truth that nobody had previously recognised, but because it manages to articulate something that you have spent years seeing with your own eyes and hearing in countless conversations, yet which still somehow struggles to find its way into mainstream thinking.
That was my experience reading The Maple Review.
Over the years, I have sat across the table from hundreds of aspiring entrepreneurs. Some have been in church halls. Some have been in libraries. Some have been in cafés. Some have been in borrowed meeting rooms with flickering fluorescent lights and coffee that had been stewing in a pot since eight o’clock that morning. The settings change, but the conversations often feel remarkably similar.
A woman who spent years caring for a relative and now wants to build something of her own. A man whose redundancy unexpectedly became the catalyst for a business idea. Someone recovering from illness who has discovered that employment no longer fits around their health, but self-employment just might. A former prisoner determined to build a different future. A parent trying to create an income that works around school runs and caring responsibilities. Different stories, different circumstances, different ambitions, yet all carrying a strikingly familiar thread.
None of them lacked ideas, very few lacked determination and most had already demonstrated levels of resilience that would put many successful business leaders to shame. What they lacked was access.
That simple observation has continued with me throughout my years at Purple Shoots, because it runs so directly contrary to the story we often tell ourselves about economic participation. We have become remarkably fond of narratives that place responsibility entirely on the individual. We celebrate hard work, persistence and determination, all of which matter enormously, but we often stop there, as though the existence of these qualities alone should be sufficient to produce success. When people struggle, we instinctively look for shortcomings in the person before we look for shortcomings in the system. We ask why they did not try harder before we ask whether the path was ever truly open to them in the first place.
The Maple Review quietly but powerfully challenges that assumption.
Running throughout its pages is an uncomfortable question. What if a significant proportion of economic exclusion has very little to do with a lack of ambition and a great deal to do with the way our institutions are designed? What if the barriers preventing people from starting businesses, creating jobs and generating income are not primarily psychological, cultural or educational, but structural? What if there are millions of people standing just outside the formal economy, not because they have nothing to contribute, but because the routes into participation have become increasingly narrow?
When you begin looking at the economy through that lens, certain things become difficult to unsee. You begin to notice how many of our systems are built around stability rather than potential. Mainstream lending works best when people have predictable incomes, conventional employment histories and relatively uncomplicated lives. That is entirely understandable. Banks are not charities and risk models exist for good reasons. But, what appears rational when viewed through the lens of an individual institution can become deeply irrational when viewed through the lens of society as a whole.
A woman spends six months away from work because of illness and suddenly finds herself viewed differently by the financial system. A parent reduces their hours to care for a child and becomes less attractive to lenders. Someone experiences a period of unemployment during a redundancy programme and discovers that their temporary setback continues to shape financial decisions years later. None of these people have necessarily become less capable. None have suddenly become less creative, less industrious or less entrepreneurial. However, their access to opportunity has narrowed.
There is a tragedy here and it is not just a personal one. It is economic one as well.
For all the discussions we have about productivity, growth and economic competitiveness, we spend remarkably little time talking about wasted human potential. We worry about skills shortages whilst overlooking people with skills. We talk about labour market participation whilst ignoring the barriers preventing participation. We debate economic growth whilst failing to notice how much growth never comes into existence because the people capable of creating it are unable to secure the modest resources needed to get started.
One of the most striking aspects of The Maple Review is the way it draws attention to the sheer scale of this overlooked space. Modern economic debate tends to focus at either end of the spectrum. On one side are discussions about welfare and poverty. On the other are discussions about venture capital, scale-ups and high-growth firms. Between these two worlds sits an enormous population of people who simply need a foothold. This would not be a six-figure investment, nor a venture capital fund nor a complex financial product. Just a realistic opportunity to test an idea, buy some equipment, purchase stock, secure a vehicle, rent a workspace or survive a difficult period whilst rebuilding a business.
The sums involved are often astonishingly small when compared to the potential impact they unlock.
At Purple Shoots we see this repeatedly and every day. A few thousand pounds can mean the difference between dependency and self-sufficiency. It can mean the difference between somebody remaining trapped in a cycle of insecurity and somebody building a stable source of income. It can mean the difference between a dream remaining forever hypothetical and becoming something tangible, something capable of employing others, generating tax revenue and contributing to the life of a community.
This is why the report’s recommendation for a National Micro-Capital System feels so important. Not because it is revolutionary, but because it reflects a growing recognition that we cannot continue pretending that access to small-scale finance will somehow solve itself. For decades we have relied on fragmented provision, scattered programmes and isolated initiatives. The result has been a patchwork of opportunity that depends heavily on geography, luck and timing. Some people find support but many never do.
What is absolutely clear is that the review proposes neither charity nor an attempt to shield people from risk. Rather, it is an acknowledgement that markets sometimes fail to reach places where value could be created. Economists have long understood this principle as the existence of public infrastructure itself reflects the reality that some investments produce benefits that private markets alone struggle to capture. Roads, schools and hospitals exist because society recognises their wider value. The question raised by the Maple Review is whether access to enterprise should increasingly be viewed in a similar way.
After all, what is the alternative?
To continue accepting a system in which entrepreneurial opportunity remains heavily influenced by personal wealth, family circumstance and financial history? To continue assuming that people who have experienced disruption, illness or hardship are inherently less capable of creating value? To continue leaving vast reserves of human potential sitting idle whilst simultaneously worrying about economic stagnation?
The longer I reflected on the report, the more I found myself returning to a phrase that summarises the landscape that we see through the Purple Shoots lens.
Belief and ideas are everywhere…..opportunity is not.
It sounds simple and perhaps even obvious, but buried within that observation is a profound challenge to how we think about economic development. If talent is widely distributed but opportunity is not, then the task of building a stronger economy is not simply about generating more talent. It is about creating more opportunity and constructing systems that allow people to translate their capabilities into participation.
That is ultimately why I hope The Maple Review does not simply become another well-received publication that enjoys a brief moment of attention before disappearing into the archives of policy history. The report matters not because it identifies problems as we already know the problems. It matters because it points towards practical solutions and because it arrives at a moment when our country is desperately searching for new sources of economic vitality.
Those sources are already here. They are sitting in our communities, caring for relatives, working multiple jobs, rebuilding after setbacks, sketching business ideas on scraps of paper, wondering whether anyone will ever take a chance on them.
The question is not whether they exist. The question is whether we are finally prepared to build an economy that sees them.