Recommendation 2

We are not convinced that the Department’s decisions about how to allocate funds were sufficiently transparent. The Department asserts that in order to help it work at pace it decided to involve special advisers in preparing its advice to Ministers on which charities should receive funding. We did not receive a satisfactory response to our questioning around how the code of conduct for special advisors was applied in this instance given that part of the role is to reinforce “the political impartiality of the permanent civil service by distinguishing the source of political advice and support”. However, the Department could not adequately explain the role taken by special advisers or the safeguards put in place during what it admits is an unusual form for funding discussions. In particular, the Department is unclear as to why special advisers met with officials after the assessment of bids from other government departments had been completed or how those discussions influenced the advice given to Ministers. The level of influence exerted by special advisers and their involvement at the point of decision making appears to go beyond what we have previously seen as Members of this Committee or in our previous Ministerial roles. Similarly, the Department is unable to adequately explain how four organisations whose bids were initially given the lowest ranking scores succeeded in securing funding as Community Match Challenge partners, meaning the Department matched the amounts fundraised by these organisations. The Department also could not clearly explain why the Zoo Support Fund received funding intended for vulnerable people, particularly when the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs already has a separate Zoo Animals Fund in place and many zoos are 6 COVID-19: Government Support for Charities businesses rather than charities. The Department, however, told us that Ministers took the decision to allocate money to zoos because of concerns about the welfare o