UP TO 70,000 jobs are under threat in small businesses, one lobby group has warned.

The Irish Small and Medium-sized Enterprise (ISME) association said yesterday that its latest employment survey showed that more than a third of its members are planning to cut jobs.

ISME reported that 91 per cent of the businesses it represented had either cut wages or frozen pay since January.

“There is also an increase in firms planning lay-offs, up to 35 per cent from 25 per cent two months ago. The figures confirm that smaller businesses are continuing to struggle and the situation will deteriorate with 70,000 jobs in immediate danger.”

ISME said that on the basis that 35 per cent of small businesses, employing a total of one million people, were planning to lay off one in five of their workers, this meant that the number of jobs under threat came to 70,000.

The group has called on the Government to drop exempt employers who hire new staff from social insurance contributions, an employment subvention fund to protect existing jobs and training subsidies for workplaces who are forced to go on short time.

ISME chief executive Mark Fielding said that the Government needed to tackle the banks’ “refusal” to lend to small and medium-sized businesses.

He also said that the Government needed to tackle the direct and indirect costs it imposed on business and introduce incentives to stimulate the economy.

“The state of the economy is such that immediate action must be taken and that urgency precludes long-drawn-out negotiations with unions, who by now are irrelevant in the general scheme of things.

“These initiatives should be examined and implemented as a matter of priority. It is far better to have employees remaining in employment than becoming a burden on the State, adding to exchequer costs.”

ISME said more than 600 small and medium-sized businesses took part in the survey.