By Yvonne Sampson, Director of Enterprise, GM Business Growth Hub          Estimated reading time: 4 minutes          Date: 15th October 2026

New research highlights the challenges faced by aspiring founders from low-income backgrounds—and what it means for business support on the ground.

Entrepreneurship is often framed as a route to opportunity, growth, and independence. But the Maple Review, published in June 2026, challenges a more uncomfortable truth: while talent is evenly distributed across society, opportunity is not.

For millions of people across the UK, starting a business isn’t just about ambition. It’s about navigating structural barriers that make entrepreneurship harder before it even begins.

The barriers are interconnected

One of the report’s most important contributions is showing how barriers combine and reinforce each other:

• Financial exclusion limits the ability to get started
• Low confidence and lack of exposure make entrepreneurship feel out of reach
• Digital exclusion restricts access to tools and markets
• Fragmented support makes help difficult to find

Together, these create a system where early-stage founders face higher risk, less support and fewer second chances.

A shift in thinking: from growth-first to access-first

At its core, the Maple Review calls for a reset in how entrepreneurship is supported in the UK.
Rather than focusing primarily on those ready to scale, it argues for a system that enables people to start safely. That means:

• Recognising microbusinesses as a central part of the economy
• Treating micro-capital as essential infrastructure
• Embedding confidence and financial capability into support
• Moving from short-term interventions to longer-term relationships

In short, shifting from a model that rewards advantage to one that builds capability.

What this means for delivery on the ground

For organisations delivering business support, the implications are practical.

• Strengthen early-stage support, where risk is highest
• Improve access to micro-finance
• Treat confidence as a core outcome
• Simplify and better connect the support landscape
• Deliver more inclusive, tailored approaches
• Value sustainability and income stability, not just scale

Taken together, this is about designing systems that reflect the realities of starting a business without a safety net.

From strategy to delivery: the Greater Manchester approach

These challenges are not abstract. Across Greater Manchester, they are already shaping how business support is being delivered.

Each year, around 12,000 businesses are supported through the GM Business Growth Hub, across a regional economy worth £63 billion, where microbusinesses play a critical role in job creation and local resilience.

Programmes such as EnterprisingYou are designed to reach founders at the earliest stages, particularly those without access to traditional networks or financial backing. Alongside practical advice, they focus on building confidence and capability, reflecting the Review's emphasis on what it really takes to get started. This aligns closely with the findings of the EnterprisingYou Insight Report, which identified many of the same challenges facing entrepreneurs, including confidence, access to finance, business skills and support networks. The strong correlation between the two reports reinforces the case for locally delivered, inclusive support that helps more people start and grow successful businesses.

Connecting local delivery to a national challenge

What happens at a local level ultimately feeds into a much bigger question. The Maple Review makes clear that inclusive entrepreneurship is not just about individual programmes, but about how the entire system works together.

Local delivery models, like those emerging in Greater Manchester, show what is possible when support is designed around real-world starting points. But scaling that impact requires continued alignment between policy, funding and delivery.

From potential to participation

If entrepreneurship is to become a genuine route to opportunity, it must be something more people can realistically pursue, not just aspire to.

That means removing the barriers that sit before the starting line.

For many, the hardest part isn’t the idea — it’s knowing where to start. For those already thinking about starting or growing a business, the message is simple: you don’t have to navigate it alone. Support is there, and increasingly designed to meet people where they are — whether that’s exploring an idea, building confidence, or taking the next step.

About the Author:

Yvonne Sampson, Director of Enterprise

Yvonne is Director of Enterprise at GM Business Growth Hub, where she leads support programmes for aspiring entrepreneurs and growing businesses across Greater Manchester. With more than 30 years' experience in enterprise and business support, she has developed initiatives that help people from a wide range of backgrounds start and grow successful businesses.