This is a House of Commons Committee report, with recommendations to government. The Government has two months to respond.
This is the full report, read the report summary.
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (the Department) was responsible for government’s business support loan schemes including the Bounce Back Loans Scheme, Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme, and Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme. In 2020–21, its budget increased from £14 billion in 2019–20 to £44 billion, with much of the increase directly attributable to the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and associated support for businesses. The British Business Bank, one of the Department’s partner organisations, was responsible for delivering all three of these business support loan schemes. In addition, seven COVID-19 business support grant schemes for businesses were delivered by local authorities acting as agents of the Department.
Together these business support schemes were intended to limit damage to businesses and the economy caused by the pandemic. The Department sought (and received) ministerial directions to proceed given the heightened risk of improper payments as a result of distributing this public money at the pace and magnitude proposed. We have reported before that the Department acted at speed to support businesses, but left the taxpayer at risk of large losses due to fraud and error.
As part of his audit of the Department’s accounts, the Comptroller and Auditor General qualified his opinion on regularity, given material levels of estimated fraud and error in COVID-19 business support loans and grants. As at the end of the March 2021, fraud and error in the Department’s COVID-19 loan schemes was estimated to be £4.9 billion, and fraud and error in its grant schemes to be just over £1 billion. The Department will continue to refine its estimates of fraud and error in these schemes over the next few years and so a total loss to taxpayers cannot yet be determined.
1. The Comptroller and Auditor General qualified his opinion of the Department’s 2020–21 accounts due to eye-watering levels of estimated fraud and error in the COVID-19 business support schemes. During 2020–21, the Department guaranteed £79.3 billion of COVID-19 loans as part of its business support schemes and estimated that its losses to fraud and error in these schemes were £4.9 billion. In the same period, of £21.8 billion the Department provided to local authorities acting as its agents to deliver COVID-19 grants to local businesses, it estimated that over £1 billion will be lost as a result of fraud and error. The Department has only estimated levels of fraud and error in £11.5 billion of these grants and does not yet know how much will be lost to fraud and error within the remaining grants. The Department considers that while its loan schemes are substantially impacted by fraud, its grant schemes are more impacted by error. As a result of these material levels of fraud and error in COVID-19 loan and grant business support schemes, the Comptroller and Auditor General qualified his opinion. As we have observed in our examination of some of these schemes, these losses represent taxpayers’ money that could have been spent on other public services.
Recommendation: The Department, as part of its Treasury Minute response, should detail how it will make sure that it is doing everything in its power to reduce the current taxpayer exposure to losses through fraud and error and to address the reasons why its accounts were qualified.
2. The Department does not have a good enough assessment of the levels of fraud and error in local authority administered business support grants. During 2020–21 and 2021–22 the Department has provided funds to local authorities to distribute to local businesses in their areas through nine grant schemes. The Department has so far only attempted to assess the extent of fraud and error in the initial three grant schemes administered in Spring 2020: the Small Business Grant Fund; Retail, Hospitality and Leisure Grant Fund; and the Local Authority Discretionary Grant Fund. The Department’s sample examined only 476 grants, representing 0.05% of grants paid out by number. The Department asserts that it is refining its estimate of fraud and error in this group by expanding its sample to nearly 5,000 grants, and that the second group of local authority administered grants would be an even larger sample of 12,000 grants. However, the Department has not yet started work on the second group and success with these larger samples relies on the capacity and willingness of local authorities to cooperate. We are concerned that local authorities have few incentives to do so given that all recovered funds are to be passed to the Department, and the limitations to the estimates of fraud and error make it challenging for the Department and local authorities to assess the time and resources required to recover these funds.
Recommendation: The Department should write to the Committee by September 2022 setting out how it will obtain full cooperation from local authorities to allow it to calculate robust fraud and error estimates for all COVID-19 business support grants, milestones for achieving these calculations, and how this information is being used to focus recovery efforts.
3. The Department does not know whether grants distributed by local authorities on its behalf have benefited businesses, including those most in need of that funding. Although the Department set the eligibility criteria for grant schemes administered by local authorities, it delegated most grant decisions to them. The Department told us that pre-payment checks did not apply to all these schemes, and that ministers prioritised delivery of grants over faster post-payment assurance sampling work. However, with only 476 grants tested, the Department does not know where the vast majority of this £21.8 billion grant funding has gone, nor the eligibility of those in receipt of it. In the absence of more granular information, the assessment it has done is already indicative of ineligible businesses receiving grant funding, eligible businesses receiving a value of grant funding they were ineligible for, or most likely a combination of both. Fraud and error in these grant payments reduces the effectiveness of these schemes to achieve their objective of providing funds to support those businesses most in need.
Recommendation: The Department should, alongside its Treasury Minute response, explain to the Committee how it is going to obtain greater assurance over the regularity and value for money of grant payments made on its behalf.
4. The Department was aware of heightened fraud risks within its COVID-19 business support schemes from the outset but did not make full use of all the tools at its disposal to prevent and detect fraud. The Department expected that some potential recipients of funding for its COVID-19 business support schemes would attempt to defraud the exchequer. It sought ministerial directions on these schemes highlighting some of the risks posed by fraud, but did not attempt to quantify the potential fraud exposure. These requests for ministerial directions also did not sufficiently identify or reflect the potential risks from organised economic crime. The number of new companies being registered in 2020–21 rose by more than 20% compared to any of the previous five years. Although the Department indicated that disruption can also present opportunity, we feel around 170,000 new companies would certainly appear to be a warning sign warranting closer scrutiny. However, the Department could not tell us whether it sought or received information from Companies House on company formation trends, and so this is unlikely to have featured in the Department’s understanding of evolving fraud risks. Each new company could potentially apply for COVID-19 business support. Lord Agnew suggested more than 1,000 companies received emergency business support despite not trading at the start of the pandemic, referring to this as a “schoolboy error”.
Recommendation: The Department should ensure that the expected scale and sources of fraud risk should be clearly communicated to ministers when ministerial directions are sought, including mitigating actions such as, for example, how the Department and Companies House would work together sharing information to prevent fraud.
The Department should, as part of its Treasury Minute response, clearly explain how it is planning to recover funds it identifies as claimed fraudulently or paid out in error.
5. The Department has yet to set out how it is learning lessons from managing its COVID-19 business support schemes to better protect taxpayers’ money in future. The Department now has two years’ worth of experience designing, implementing, and managing COVID-19 business support schemes, and some experience of recovery activities where fraud and error has been identified. It has identified some learning that, for example, has allowed it to refine its approach to identifying fraud and error in COVID-19 business support grants. However, this is to reduce shortcomings in existing schemes, and we would expect to see the Department demonstrating that it is learning wider lessons from these schemes which it could then apply to improve its stewardship of public funds in the future. Several of the Department’s major areas of expenditure in the coming years, such as supporting public sector decarbonisation and achieving net zero, will again require routing taxpayer funds through third parties as it did with COVID-19 business support schemes. We would expect lessons the Department has learned during the pandemic to support the design and delivery of these future schemes.
Recommendation: The Department should continue to refine its estimates of the levels of fraud and error across its COVID-19 business support schemes, recovering monies to reduce losses to the public purse and apply any lessons learned from these to future support schemes. It should write to the Committee before the end of the year to set out how it is applying lessons learned in its ongoing activities.
6. The Post Office’s mismanagement of its Horizon programme has had devastating consequences for individuals wrongly accused of fraud. The financial cost of compensating these individuals will largely fall to the public purse. The Horizon accounting system erroneously recorded shortfalls of cash in local Post Office branches over its more than 20-year lifetime. The Post Office considered some of these shortfalls to be caused by subpostmasters and subpostmistresses, resulting in those staff being dismissed and the Post Office taking action to attempt to recover the ‘losses’ and in some cases leading to prosecutions and people being wrongly convicted. The Department estimates that the ‘Historical Shortfall Scheme’, set up by the Post Office to compensate those who may have experienced and repaid shortfalls (for example from their own funds), is likely to cost £153 million, of which it has set aside £65 million. The Secretary of State for the Department is the sole shareholder of the Post Office, and the Department will provide sufficient financial support to Post Office to cover the scheme. The government has also committed to paying compensation for overturned criminal convictions and estimates that this may cost the taxpayer up to £780 million. The government has also committed to covering the cost of this compensation.
Recommendation: The Department should write to the Committee alongside its Treasury Minute response to set out what actions are being taken to ensure Post Office Ltd remains a viable company.
Where the Department (or HM Government) provides assurances to Post Office Ltd over the funding of its liabilities, it should inform the Committee at the earliest opportunity.
1. On the basis of a report by the Comptroller and Auditor General we took evidence from the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (the Department) on its performance in 2020–21.1
2. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (the Department) was responsible for government’s business support loan schemes including the Bounce Back Loans Scheme, Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme, and Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme.2 In 2020–21, its budget increased to £44 billion from £14 billion in 2019–20, with much of the increase directly attributable to the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and associated support for businesses.3 The British Business Bank, one of the Department’s partner organisations, was responsible for delivering all three of these business support loan schemes. In addition, seven COVID-19 business support grant schemes for businesses were delivered by local authorities acting primarily as agents of the Department.4
3. Together these business support schemes were intended to limit damage to businesses and the economy caused by the pandemic, such as restrictions to trading imposed by government due to social distancing requirements, or challenges in raising working capital. To protect businesses and the economy, the government encouraged the Department to establish these measures quickly, and to prioritise speed when distributing funding.5 The Department sought (and received) ministerial directions to proceed given the heightened risk of improper payments as a result of distributing this public money at the pace and magnitude proposed.6 Our examination of business support schemes during the pandemic, including the Bounce Back Loans Scheme, has shown that the Department acted at impressive speed to support individuals, but left the taxpayer at risk of large losses due to fraud and error.7
4. As part of his audit of the Department’s accounts, the Comptroller and Auditor General was content that these presented a true and fair view of the state of its affairs.8 However, he qualified his opinion on regularity, reflecting that spending was not in line with Parliamentary expectations, given material levels of estimated fraud and error in COVID-19 business support loans and grants.9 As at the end of the March 2021, fraud and error in the Department’s COVID-19 loan schemes was estimated to be £4.9 billion, and fraud and error in its grant schemes just over £1 billion.10 The Department will continue to refine its estimates of fraud and error in these schemes over the next few years, including taking into account any COVID-19 funding provided after 2020–21 as well as any funds recovered, and so a total loss to taxpayers cannot yet be determined.11
5. During 2020–21, the Department guaranteed £79.3 billion of loans and provided £21.8 billion in grant funding to local authorities in England as part of its response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The government guaranteed loans were provided through the Bounce Back Loans Scheme (BBLS), Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) and Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CLBILS). All three loan schemes were administered by the British Business Bank, one of the Department’s partner organisations. The grant funding was distributed by local authorities, primarily acting as agents of the Department, through the Small Business Grant Fund; Retail, Hospitality and Leisure Grant Fund; Local Authority Discretionary Grant Fund; Local Restriction Support Grants (multiple scheme iterations); Additional Restrictions Grant; Christmas Support Package; and Closed Business Lockdown Payment.12 The Department told us that it set up both the loan and grant schemes with levels of fraud and error risk that it would never normally tolerate.13 It considers that while its loan schemes are substantially impacted by fraud, its grant schemes are more impacted by error.14
6. Of the £79.3 billion of COVID-19 loans, the Department estimated its credit loss at £19.8 billion, that is where lenders will call on government guarantees as borrowers default or loans will otherwise not be repaid.15 This includes an estimated loss of £4.9 billion to fraud through its loan schemes.16 This figure represents the central estimate in a range between £3.6 billion (8.15%) and nearly £6.3 billion (14.15%), and relates only to the £46 billion of loans guaranteed by the Bounce Back Loans Scheme, as the Department has not tested for fraud in CBILS and CLBILS.17 The Department is continuing to refine its estimates and considers that a more realistic fraud figure may be 7.5%; however, this is based on information that only became available in May 2021 and is not yet assessed by the Department.18 If true, this could imply a loss of around £3.3 billion rather than £4.9 billion.19
7. In addition to its guaranteed loan schemes, the Department provided £21.8 billion in grant funding to local authorities to distribute to businesses in their areas. The Department set the eligibility criteria and provided guidance on grant making to local authorities.20 In the first three grant schemes, which account for £11.5 billion21 of this funding, the Department estimates 8.9%, or just over £1 billion, is lost to fraud and error.22 Again, this figure represents a central estimate in a range between £514 million (4.4%) and nearly £1.6 billion (13.4%).23 The Department told us that this was an estimate that it has low confidence in.24 In written evidence, the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW), a regulator of the accountancy and audit profession, believes there is a significant chance that this underestimates the level of fraud and error; however, it also considers that the Department has had sufficient time to collect the information it needs from local authorities and perform adequate checks to calculate a more accurate estimate.25 As a result of these material levels of fraud and error in COVID-19 loan and grant business support schemes, the Comptroller and Auditor General qualified his opinion.26 In several of our recent reports such as HMRC Performance in 2020–21, The Department for Work and Pensions’ Accounts 2020–21—Fraud and error in the benefits system and Bounce Back Loan Schemes: Follow-up we have highlighted COVID-19 losses to the public purse and the opportunity cost this imposes on providing other public services.27
8. Of the £21.8 billion grant funding the Department provided to local authorities to distribute in their areas in 2020–21, the Department has so far attempted to assess the extent of fraud and error in only £11.5 billion of this funding, and through a sample of only 476 grants. This very small sample represents only 0.05% by number out of a total population of circa one million grants.28 The Department now considers this insufficient to gain an accurate picture of the true level of fraud and error in these payments and has initiated a tenfold increase in its sampling of these grants to inform its 2021–22 accounts.29 The Department also told us it has committed to an even larger sample of 12,000 for its second group of grants, which it also distributed to local authorities in 2020–21.30 It has not yet started assessing fraud and error in this group and considers it unlikely that it will be able to report on these until its 2022–23 accounts.31 In addition, the Department continued to provide grant funding to local authorities in 2021–22 as part of a third group of schemes, but also considers it unlikely that it will have reliable fraud and error estimates for this group until its 2022–23 accounts.32 The ICAEW told us that non-complex fraud and error in these latter schemes could total between £318 million and £968 million if levels are comparable to those in the schemes the Department has assessed so far.33
9. The success of these larger samples relies on the capacity and cooperation of local authorities to respond to the Department’s requests for information.34 The Department considers that it has not yet given local authorities the opportunity to do the necessary reconciliations, as it has been asking so much of them to deliver grant schemes.35 However, the ICAEW also noted that when government places additional responsibilities on local government, it is vital that it provides sufficient additional resources to enable it to administer these additional responsibilities. It indicated that the Department did not appear to have provided additional resource to enable local authorities to do so and it was therefore not surprising that some have struggled to meet the reporting and assurance requirements. It highlighted that the business support grants represented significant additional activity for some smaller local authorities, such as East Lindsey District Council, which distributed £46.5 million of payments under these schemes compared to total expenditure of £99.6 million reported in its 2020–21 accounts.36 A local authority is also responsible for any recovery actions where it has made ineligible payments.37 Local authorities would appear to have limited incentives to do so given they must cover the costs of debt recovery and prosecutions, and any recovered funds return to the Department.38 The limitations to the estimates of fraud and error also make it challenging for the Department and local authorities to assess the time and resources required to recover these funds.39
10. Despite recognising these limitations and uncertainty in its current estimates, the Department does not believe that its grant funding has been subject to significant fraud.40 It suggests that fraud will ultimately range between 1% and 2%, which it would consider as ‘normal’ and consistent with its expectations.41 Conversely, it suggests that it has been more surprised by grant schemes impacted by error where local authorities have made payments to ineligible businesses or have overpaid to eligible businesses.42
11. Although the Department set eligibility criteria for grant schemes administered by local authorities, it delegated most grant decisions to them. The Department told us that it provided clear guidance to local authorities on recordkeeping requirements and the need to be able to reconcile payments for the purposes of audit.43 However, it also told us that administering these grants had put real pressure on local authorities, despite the Department not always requiring them to conduct pre-payment eligibility checks before making grant payments to businesses. As with other schemes set up during the pandemic that we have reported on, the Department told us that it launched schemes with ‘consciously insufficient levels of upfront control’, and with ministers prioritising delivery of grants to businesses over doing (post-payment assurance) sampling faster.44
12. Having sampled only 476 grants distributed by local authorities out of circa one million grants made, the Department therefore has very little visibility of which businesses have benefited from these schemes.45 It cannot say whether many businesses in receipt of grants were eligible, and whether those that were both eligible and received grant funding received the right amount. The very limited assessment it has already done suggests ineligible businesses receiving grant funding, and some eligible businesses received a value of grant funding they were ineligible for. Neither furthers the policy objectives of these schemes, to support those businesses most in need, and the taxpayer also loses value for money.
13. The Department was responsible for a substantial component of government’s overall financial response to the pandemic, resulting in the third-largest estimated lifetime costs of any department, as reported by the National Audit Office’s COVID-19 cost tracker.46 We have previously reported that government prioritised speed when designing and implementing measures to limit the damage to the economy and people’s livelihoods from the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, launching schemes in a matter of weeks.47 This approach presented its own risks, and the Department acknowledged that it expected some potential recipients of funding for COVID-19 business support schemes would attempt to defraud the exchequer, and that it chose consciously to tolerate this following ministerial directions48 to proceed.49 However, there are high levels of fraud in some of these schemes, and the request for the Bounce Back Loans Scheme ministerial direction, for example, did not attempt to quantify the potential fraud exposure, or identify who the perpetrators of fraud might be, despite flagging the risk as ‘very high’.50
14. Registrations of new companies on Companies House increased sharply during 2020–21. During the period 2015–16 to 2019–20, annual new company registrations averaged 640,000. By comparison, in 2020–21 there were more than 810,000, making new company registrations in that year more than 20% higher than in any of the preceding five.51 Companies House does not validate information provided to them when a new company is registered, or do checks to confirm a person with a role in a company exists.52 The Department told us that disruption can create legitimate business opportunities and the increase in and of itself is not an indicator of anything adverse; however, the Department did not evidence this assertion, and we are sceptical that creative disruption accounts for the 170,000 new companies and feel that this should have been a warning warranting closer scrutiny.53 The Department did not know whether it sought or received information from Companies House for company formation trends, and as such these ‘unusual patterns’ are unlikely to have featured in the Department’s understanding of evolving fraud risks.54 In addition, each of these new companies could potentially apply for COVID-19 business support. Lord Agnew, former Minister of State with counter-fraud responsibility, noted in his January resignation address to the House of Lords that “schoolboy errors” were made, including allowing more than 1,000 companies that weren’t trading when the pandemic struck to receive support under the Bounce Back Loans scheme.55
15. The Department launched its first COVID-19 business support scheme shortly after the first lockdown was announced on 23 March 2020. Since then, the Department has launched many more, and now has around two years’ worth of experience of designing, implementing, and managing its COVID-19 business support schemes.56 It has taken some actions seeking to apply learning to improve these schemes and reduce fraud and error, including approaching other departments to learn from them, such as the Cabinet Office counter-fraud function. It subsequently increased capability and capacity in its own counter-fraud function, with one of this function’s new duties being to undertake mandatory fraud risk assessments at outline and final business case stages when considering new policy.57 The ICAEW told us that it believes the Department should strengthen its counter-fraud capacity and capability more widely, particularly as grants are likely to play a key role in delivering the government’s Net Zero Strategy.58
16. As some COVID-19 business support schemes have increasingly become part of business as usual, the Department told us that, for example in relation to grants distributed by local authorities, its systems and methods are now approaching maturity. It considers it has improved its guidance to local authorities and refined its approach to identifying fraud and error in these grant schemes.59 However, lessons learnt seem to have been largely actions in pursuit of reducing shortcomings in existing schemes rather than learning wider lessons that could be applied to limit fraud and error in future schemes. The ICAEW recommends that the government establishes a standard framework for assuring grants delivered through local authorities, providing clarity to the respective reporting roles of central and local government, as well as measures to be used to detect and prevent fraud and error.60
17. The Department has commissioned evaluation of its business support schemes; however, it cautioned that it is proving challenging to separate the impact of various aspects of government’s overall support package which also included, for example the furlough scheme.61 Several of the Department’s major areas of expenditure in the coming years, such as supporting public sector decarbonisation and achieving net zero, will again require routing taxpayer funds through third parties as it did with COVID-19 business support schemes.
18. Between 1997 and 2000 the Post Office implemented a new IT system called Horizon. This system is now known to be responsible for accounting discrepancies that suggested, for example, shortfalls of cash in Post Office branches.62 At the time, the Post Office considered some of these shortfalls to be caused by branch staff such as postmasters, resulting in dismissals, attempts to recover apparent losses, and in some cases prosecutions. Such actions had terrible personal and financial consequences for honest, hard-working staff, wrongly accused of misconduct and crime. In May 2020 the Post Office set up the Horizon Historical Shortfall Scheme to compensate staff who may have experienced cash shortfalls reported by the Horizon system through the normal course of their duties, and repaid shortfalls from their own funds.63
19. In December 2020 the Department wrote to the Post Office, noting that the number of applications to the Scheme was ‘…materially higher than expected resulting in a corresponding increase in possible scheme claims and costs…’ and that the Post Office considered ‘…any amount in excess of the original budget will be unaffordable…’. With the Secretary of State as sole shareholder of the Post Office, the Department determined that it would apply to HM Treasury for future funding so the Post Office could meet its obligations for payments under the scheme (providing so-called ‘comfort’ to the Post Office that it would be able to meet its liabilities as and when they fall due).64
20. The Department currently estimates that the scheme is likely to cost £153 million, of which £89 million is from the Post Office and £65 million is from the Department.65 The Department noted that its contribution was its current best estimate, and did not represent a hard and fast limit: should the estimate prove to be too low, then it will be increased.66 In addition to the scheme, the government has committed to covering the costs of compensation to those former Post Office employees wrongly convicted of criminal offenses. The Department currently estimates this may cost the taxpayer up to £780 million.67
Members present:
Dame Meg Hillier
Shaun Bailey
Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown
Peter Grant
Kate Green
Antony Higginbotham
Angela Richardson
James Wild
Draft Report (Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy Annual Report and Accounts 2020–21), proposed by the Chair, brought up and read.
Ordered, That the draft Report be read a second time, paragraph by paragraph.
Paragraphs 1 to 20 read and agreed to.
Summary agreed to.
Introduction agreed to.
Conclusions and recommendations agreed to.
Resolved, That the Report be the First of the Committee to the House.
Ordered, That the Chair make the Report to the House.
Ordered, That embargoed copies of the Report be made available, in accordance with the provisions of Standing Order No. 134.
Adjourned till Monday 16 May at 3:30pm
The following witnesses gave evidence. Transcripts can be viewed on the inquiry publications page of the Committee’s website.
Sarah Munby, Permanent Secretary, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy; Tom Taylor, Strategic Finance Director & Chief Financial Officer, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy; Kim Humberstone OBE, Co-Director of Finance, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial StrategyQ1–103
The following written evidence was received and can be viewed on the inquiry publications page of the Committee’s website.
BRA numbers are generated by the evidence processing system and so may not be complete.
1 ICAEW (BRA0001)
All publications from the Committee are available on the publications page of the Committee’s website.
|
Number |
Title |
Reference |
|
1st |
Low emission cars |
HC 186 |
|
2nd |
BBC strategic financial management |
HC 187 |
|
3rd |
COVID-19: Support for children’s education |
HC 240 |
|
4th |
COVID-19: Local government finance |
HC 239 |
|
5th |
COVID-19: Government Support for Charities |
HC 250 |
|
6th |
Public Sector Pensions |
HC 289 |
|
7th |
Adult Social Care Markets |
HC 252 |
|
8th |
COVID 19: Culture Recovery Fund |
HC 340 |
|
9th |
Fraud and Error |
HC 253 |
|
10th |
Overview of the English rail system |
HC 170 |
|
11th |
Local auditor reporting on local government in England |
HC 171 |
|
12th |
COVID 19: Cost Tracker Update |
HC 173 |
|
13th |
Initial lessons from the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic |
HC 175 |
|
14th |
Windrush Compensation Scheme |
HC 174 |
|
15th |
DWP Employment support |
HC 177 |
|
16th |
Principles of effective regulation |
HC 176 |
|
17th |
High Speed 2: Progress at Summer 2021 |
HC 329 |
|
18th |
Government’s delivery through arm’s-length bodies |
HC 181 |
|
19th |
Protecting consumers from unsafe products |
HC 180 |
|
20th |
Optimising the defence estate |
HC 179 |
|
21st |
School Funding |
HC 183 |
|
22nd |
Improving the performance of major defence equipment contracts |
HC 185 |
|
23rd |
Test and Trace update |
HC 182 |
|
24th |
Crossrail: A progress update |
HC 184 |
|
25th |
The Department for Work and Pensions’ Accounts 2020–21 – Fraud and error in the benefits system |
HC 633 |
|
26th |
Lessons from Greensill Capital: accreditation to business support schemes |
HC 169 |
|
27th |
Green Homes Grant Voucher Scheme |
HC 635 |
|
28th |
Efficiency in government |
HC 636 |
|
29th |
The National Law Enforcement Data Programme |
HC 638 |
|
30th |
Challenges in implementing digital change |
HC 637 |
|
31st |
Environmental Land Management Scheme |
HC 639 |
|
32nd |
Delivering gigabitcapable broadband |
HC 743 |
|
33rd |
Underpayments of the State Pension |
HC 654 |
|
34th |
Local Government Finance System: Overview and Challenges |
HC 646 |
|
35th |
The pharmacy early payment and salary advance schemes in the NHS |
HC 745 |
|
36th |
EU Exit: UK Border post transition |
HC 746 |
|
37th |
HMRC Performance in 2020–21 |
HC 641 |
|
38th |
COVID-19 cost tracker update |
HC 640 |
|
39th |
DWP Employment Support: Kickstart Scheme |
HC 655 |
|
40th |
Excess votes 2020–21: Serious Fraud Office |
HC 1099 |
|
41st |
Achieving Net Zero: Follow up |
HC 642 |
|
42nd |
Financial sustainability of schools in England |
HC 650 |
|
43rd |
Reducing the backlog in criminal courts |
HC 643 |
|
44th |
NHS backlogs and waiting times in England |
HC 747 |
|
45th |
Progress with trade negotiations |
HC 993 |
|
46th |
Government preparedness for the COVID-19 pandemic: lessons for government on risk |
HC 952 |
|
47th |
Academies Sector Annual Report and Accounts 2019/20 |
HC 994 |
|
48th |
HMRC’s management of tax debt |
HC 953 |
|
49th |
Regulation of private renting |
HC 996 |
|
50th |
Bounce Back Loans Scheme: Follow-up |
HC 951 |
|
51st |
Improving outcomes for women in the criminal justice system |
HC 997 |
|
52nd |
Ministry of Defence Equipment Plan 2021–31 |
HC 1164 |
|
1st Special Report |
Fifth Annual Report of the Chair of the Committee of Public Accounts |
HC 222 |
|
Number |
Title |
Reference |
|
1st |
Support for children with special educational needs and disabilities |
HC 85 |
|
2nd |
Defence Nuclear Infrastructure |
HC 86 |
|
3rd |
High Speed 2: Spring 2020 Update |
HC 84 |
|
4th |
EU Exit: Get ready for Brexit Campaign |
HC 131 |
|
5th |
University technical colleges |
HC 87 |
|
6th |
Excess votes 2018–19 |
HC 243 |
|
7th |
Gambling regulation: problem gambling and protecting vulnerable people |
HC 134 |
|
8th |
NHS capital expenditure and financial management |
HC 344 |
|
9th |
Water supply and demand management |
HC 378 |
|
10th |
Defence capability and the Equipment Plan |
HC 247 |
|
11th |
Local authority investment in commercial property |
HC 312 |
|
12th |
Management of tax reliefs |
HC 379 |
|
13th |
Whole of Government Response to COVID-19 |
HC 404 |
|
14th |
Readying the NHS and social care for the COVID-19 peak |
HC 405 |
|
15th |
Improving the prison estate |
HC 244 |
|
16th |
Progress in remediating dangerous cladding |
HC 406 |
|
17th |
Immigration enforcement |
HC 407 |
|
18th |
NHS nursing workforce |
HC 408 |
|
19th |
Restoration and renewal of the Palace of Westminster |
HC 549 |
|
20th |
Tackling the tax gap |
HC 650 |
|
21st |
Government support for UK exporters |
HC 679 |
|
22nd |
Digital transformation in the NHS |
HC 680 |
|
23rd |
Delivering carrier strike |
HC 684 |
|
24th |
Selecting towns for the Towns Fund |
HC 651 |
|
25th |
Asylum accommodation and support transformation programme |
HC 683 |
|
26th |
Department of Work and Pensions Accounts 2019–20 |
HC 681 |
|
27th |
Covid-19: Supply of ventilators |
HC 685 |
|
28th |
The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority’s management of the Magnox contract |
HC 653 |
|
29th |
Whitehall preparations for EU Exit |
HC 682 |
|
30th |
The production and distribution of cash |
HC 654 |
|
31st |
Starter Homes |
HC 88 |
|
32nd |
Specialist Skills in the civil service |
HC 686 |
|
33rd |
Covid-19: Bounce Back Loan Scheme |
HC 687 |
|
34th |
Covid-19: Support for jobs |
HC 920 |
|
35th |
Improving Broadband |
HC 688 |
|
36th |
HMRC performance 2019–20 |
HC 690 |
|
37th |
Whole of Government Accounts 2018–19 |
HC 655 |
|
38th |
Managing colleges’ financial sustainability |
HC 692 |
|
39th |
Lessons from major projects and programmes |
HC 694 |
|
40th |
Achieving government’s long-term environmental goals |
HC 927 |
|
41st |
COVID 19: the free school meals voucher scheme |
HC 689 |
|
42nd |
COVID-19: Government procurement and supply of Personal Protective Equipment |
HC 928 |
|
43rd |
COVID-19: Planning for a vaccine Part 1 |
HC 930 |
|
44th |
Excess Votes 2019–20 |
HC 1205 |
|
45th |
Managing flood risk |
HC 931 |
|
46th |
Achieving Net Zero |
HC 935 |
|
47th |
COVID-19: Test, track and trace (part 1) |
HC 932 |
|
48th |
Digital Services at the Border |
HC 936 |
|
49th |
COVID-19: housing people sleeping rough |
HC 934 |
|
50th |
Defence Equipment Plan 2020–2030 |
HC 693 |
|
51st |
Managing the expiry of PFI contracts |
HC 1114 |
|
52nd |
Key challenges facing the Ministry of Justice |
HC 1190 |
|
53rd |
Covid 19: supporting the vulnerable during lockdown |
HC 938 |
|
54th |
Improving single living accommodation for service personnel |
HC 940 |
|
55th |
Environmental tax measures |
HC 937 |
|
56th |
Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund |
HC 941 |
1 Report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021
2 C&AG’s Report, Introduction, page 130
3 Chair’s opening statement
4 Q 67; C&AG’s Report, Introduction, page 130
5 Qq 9, 41, 63; C&AG’s Report, page 131
6 Qq 9, 41, 59–60; C&AG’s Report, page 133
7 Oral evidence: Bounce Back Loan Scheme: Follow up, HC 951, Q 1
8 The Certificate of the Comptroller and Auditor General to the House of Commons, Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021, Opinion on financial statements, page 124
9 C&AG’s Report
10 C&AG’s Report, pages 130–134
11 Qq 10, 13, 67, 72–77, 99–101; C&AG’s Report, page 134
12 Q 67; C&AG’s Report, page 130
13 Q 24
14 Qq 9, 17
15 C&AG’s Report, Introduction, page 130
16 C&AG’s Report, pages 130–133
17 Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021, Accountability report, page 121 and Note 19, page 215; C&AG’s Report, page 133
18 Q 10; C&AG’s Report, page 132
19 If 11.15% implies a fraud loss of £4.9 billion, 7.5% would equate to approximately £3.3 billion
20 Q 67; C&AG’s Report, pages 130, 133–134
21 Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021, Note 4.4, page 167: £10,824 million in 2019–20 plus £683 million in 2020–21 = £11,507 million or £11.5 billion
22 Qq 10, 13, 33–36; Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021, Accountability report, page 122
23 Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021, Accountability report, page 122
24 Q 10
25 ICAEW, pages 4–5, paras 12–13
26 C&AG’s Report, pages 130–134
27 Q 68; Committee of Public Accounts, HMRC Performance in 2020–21, Thirty-Seventh Report of Session 2021–22, HC 641, 11 February 2022; Committee of Public Accounts, The Department for Work and Pensions’ Accounts 2020–21 – Fraud and error in the benefits system, Twenty-Fifth Report of Session 2021–22, HC 633, 17 November 2021; Committee of Public Accounts, Bounce Back Loan Schemes: Follow-up, Fiftieth Report of Session 2021–22, HC 951 on 27 April 2022
28 Qq 33–36; C&AG’s Report, pages 130, 133; Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021, Accountability report, page 122
29 Qq 34, 67
30 Q 67
31 Qq 67, 72–77
32 Qq 10, 72–77
33 ICAEW, para 14
34 Q 67
35 Q 69
36 ICAEW, paras 24–25
37 68–70
38 Qq 12, 68–71, 77, 97, 103
39 Qq 63, 97–99, 103
40 Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021, Accountability report, page 122
41 Qq 9–10, 13
42 Q 17
43 Q 67
44 Qq 15, 63
45 Qq 33–36; Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021, Accountability report, page 122
46 The COVID-19 cost tracker, available at: COVID-19 cost tracker – National Audit Office (NAO)
47 Q 41
48 Ministerial directions are formal instructions from ministers telling their department to proceed with a spending proposal, despite an objection from their permanent secretary (on grounds of risks to regularity, propriety, value for money or feasibility: the parliamentary expectations of the stewardship of public funds)
49 Qq 9, 17
50 Correspondence from Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy Accounting Officer to Secretary of State for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy seeking ministerial direction on the introduction of the Bounce Back Loan Scheme, 1 May 2020
51 Q 19
52 Q 84
53 Qq 18–21
54 Qq 18, 21
55 Q 16
56 Q 64
57 Q 62
58 ICAEW, paras 20, 26, 34
59 Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Annual report and accounts 2020–21, 25 November 2021, Accountability report, page 123
60 ICAEW, paras 34–35
61 Q 40
62 Q 79
63 Qq 79, 80
64 Correspondence from the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy to the Board of Directors, Post Office Ltd., 14 December 2020
65 Q 78
66 Q 79
67 Qq 78–80