Recommendation 3

There was a fundamental absence of formal governance arrangements at UKHSA and the Department failed to respond to the heightened risks of setting up a new and complex organisation at pace. UKHSA was created on 1 April 2021 with unsatisfactory governance arrangements. Although the Non-executive Chair and Chief Executive were in post from 1 April 2021, no more non-executive directors were appointed until April 2022, one month after its first year-end. The lack of governance resulted in inadequate scrutiny and assurance of UKHSA’s operations. The Chief Executive was appointed into a role, as Accounting Officer and Chief Executive, of which she had no previous experience and relied heavily on the Non- executive Chair for support stepping into this position. The Non-executive Chair’s role therefore shifted from one which should have been scrutinising management to one of an executive member of the organisation. The Department failed to support UKHSA, taking a light touch approach to the governance arrangements in place, identifying risks but failing to make any arrangements to mitigate these issues. In addition, the Department did not provide UKHSA with a budget until after the year end. UKHSA’s Non-executive Chair told us that this meant that the function of the new organisation remained uncertain and that the mandate of any non-executives would not have been sufficiently clear. Recommendation 3: The Department must work with UKHSA to ensure that the governance arrangements at UKHSA are assessed, rectified and that the remaining vacancies within its governance structure are resolved as a matter of urgency.