Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 25
25
Accepted
HM Treasury not committed to continuing COVID-19 cost tracker beyond 2021-22 financial year.
Conclusion
The NAO collated and published information on the government’s response to the pandemic in its COVID-19 cost tracker, the first iteration of which was published in September 2020.40 The cost tracker is now maintained by HM Treasury, and this expenditure was included in the 2020–21 WGA. The Treasury told us that it thought that it would want to carry on including the cost tracker in the 2021–22, but it did not commit to producing the cost tracker or incorporating it into the WGA beyond the 2021–22 WGA.41 The Treasury explained that in future it would need to consider how much to keep revising the cost tracker when changes would start to become quite small, “but not for the next 36 Committee of Public Accounts, Initial lessons from the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Thirteenth Report of Session 2021–22, HC 175, 25 July 2021 37 Committee of Public Accounts, Bounce Back Loans Scheme: Follow-up, Fiftieth Report of Session 2021–22, HC 951, 27 April 2022 38 Q 30–31; Committee of Public Accounts, COVID-19: Culture Recovery Fund, Eighth Report of Session 2021–22, HC 340, 23 June 2021 39 Qq 40–42 40 Committee of Public Accounts, Covid-19: Cost tracker update, Thirty-Eighth Report of Session 2021–22, HC 640, 23 February 2022 41 Q 31, 41 Whole of Government Accounts 2020–21 17 year or two”.42 It told us that, if it reached the point at which it thought that maintaining or updating the cost tracker was not necessary, it would think about what approach will be needed to ensure the long-term traceability of costs for future generations of officials and elected representatives. Such an approach must survive even changes in the machinery of government and the departure of staff with the required current and historical knowledge of the relevant balances.43
Government Response Summary
The government agrees with the committee's implicit recommendation to ensure long-term traceability of COVID-related costs and commits to setting out further details on how it will continue tracking these costs after the current HMT Covid Cost Tracker is published in summer 2024, targeting Autumn 2024 for implementation.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
4.1 The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Target implementation date: Autumn 2024 4.2 HM Treasury recognises the value of continuing to track COVID-related costs beyond the Cost Tracker. In addition to the Cost Tracker, some departments publish regular updates on key items of spending, e.g. DCMS published a report on the Cultural Recovery Fund, and DBT publish quarterly repayment data on the largest COVID loan schemes. 4.3 HM Treasury will set out further details on how it will continue to track ongoing COVID-related costs after the publication of the HMT Covid Cost Tracker in summer 2024. This will allow us to understand which areas of COVID spending remain “live” and how best to continue tracking spend in these areas.