Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Conclusion 6
20th Report - DCMS management of COVID-19 loans
Published 2 Apr 2025
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee DCMS management of COVID-19 loans All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
Owing to a conflict of interest, the Department has allowed a gap to arise in accountability to Parliament for a significant amount of public money relating to the loans it made to rugby union. Since her appointment as Permanent Secretary in 2023, the Department’s Accounting Officer has had a conflict of interest regarding rugby union. She has properly declared this conflict and recused herself from relevant discussions and decisions, and the Department has put in place arrangements involving other Department staff to handle the conflict. However, the Department is most heavily exposed to rugby union in terms of both the amount of loans it has made and the financial health of the sport. The conflict of interest meant that we could not question the Permanent Secretary directly about the £124 million that the Department had loaned to top–tier rugby union clubs (57% of its total COVID loans to sports bodies) and its subsequent management of these loans. recommendation The Department should consider alternative arrangements for filling the accountability gap to Parliament relating to rugby union loans, for example involving the Permanent Secretary of another department, who could be appointed as the Accounting Officer for this item. 7 1 The arrangements for managing the loan book Introduction
From: Public Accounts Committee, 20th Report - DCMS management of COVID-19 loans (HC 364), 2 April 2025
Government response
Latest Treasury Minutes progress report to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Twentieth Report of Session 2024-26
The government responded to the whole report on 4 June 2026.
Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Twentieth report from Session 2024-25
Published 10 July 2025.
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government agrees with the Committee's recommendations on loan book management, the loan management system, long-term options, repayment forecasts, borrower management and borrower engagement, but disagrees with the recommendation on rugby union accountability.
- On long-term options, the government agrees and says a strategic review, to be completed in 2025-26, will assess options "including, but not limited to, a sale or partial sale of the loan book".
- On repayment estimates, the government agrees, with a target date of December 2025. It says further cost, repayment and insolvency modelling will be done through its strategic review.
- On the PwC contract, the government agrees and says the full loan management system functionality was implemented in March 2025 "for under £300,000". The PwC contract has been extended for a further year.
- On rugby union accountability, the government disagrees with the recommendation. It "continues to believe" accountability is best achieved by a Director General within the department as Additional Accounting Officer, rather than a Permanent Secretary from another department.