In mid-November the Committee will question the most senior officials at the Treasury and HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) in its latest inquiry into the Government’s response to the Covid-19: this time on the programmes to support jobs during the pandemic.
The Government implemented the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme - widely known as the “furlough scheme” - and the Self Employment Income Support Scheme to help businesses and their employees, and the self-employed, cope with the COVID-19 pandemic. The combined value of these schemes is currently estimated to be around £75 billion.
This inquiry is based on the latest in the NAO’s programme of work on Covid-19, which considers HM Revenue & Customs’ and HM Treasury’s implementation of the schemes so far, including how they have been set-up and whether they have reached the groups intended
The NAO’s investigation will also report on how they are mitigating the risk of fraud in the schemes. In previous evidence to the Committee the Government has estimated fraud and error in the scheme may be as high as 10%.
If you have evidence on the how the Covid-19 job support schemes have been implemented, and whether they represent value for taxpayers money in the pandemic, please submit it here by Thursday 5th November 2020 at 6:00pm.