COVID schemes’ fraud and error cost taxpayers £11bn

COVID-19 fraud and error cost the taxpayer nearly £11bn, a government watchdog has found.

Pandemic support programmes such as furlough, bounce-back loans, and Eat Out to Help Out led to £10.9bn in fraud and error, the COVID-19 Counter-Fraud Commissioner Tom Hayhoe’s final report has concluded.

Lack of government data to target economic support made it “easy” for fraudsters to claim under more than one scheme and secure dual funding, the report said.

Weak accountability, bad quality data and poor contracting were identified as the primary causes of the loss.

Fraud risks were increased due to the design of the schemes and the absence of fraud expertise, the report said.

Government departments generally worked independently and designed schemes from scratch, which led to a “high degree of novelty” in the design and introduced greater fraud risk.

This was especially the case as cross-government fraud expertise was “often not brought in” to advise on risk mitigation.

Measures to protect against fraud are said to be “inadequate” in the report.

The government has said the sum is enough to fund daily free school meals for the UK’s 2.7 million eligible children for eight years.

An earlier report from Mr Hayhoe found failed personal protective equipment (PPE) contracts during the pandemic cost the taxpayer £1.4bn, with £76m spent on unused protective equipment unlikely ever to be recovered.

Factors behind the lost money had included government over-ordering PPE and quality control delays.

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