The American Small Business League (ASBL) has attacked the outgoing president over his "anti-small business policies" that it claims have dismantled support for companies across the United States.

In a statement, the group delivered a damning verdict of two terms of Mr Bush's small business policies, including his decision to remove the head of the Small Business Administration (SBA) from the cabinet.

The organization also criticized the White House over a "dozen federal investigations" that it claims have uncovered fraud, abuse and a general lack of oversight in the government's small business contracting programs.

By law, a minimum 23 percent of government contracts should go to small businesses. However, the ASBL contents that much of this work is being diverted to large corporations in both the US and Europe.

Based on a series of Freedom of Information Act lawsuits against the administration, the ASBL estimates that small firms miss out on over $100 billion every year because of this.

The Washington Post has today (October 22nd) released an investigation showing that $89 billion of small business awards included contracts for Lockheed Martin and Dell Computers, a Fortune 500 firm.

SBA officials said these are agency "errors" that have been corrected.