FRAUD-U-LENT FIGURES
CHANCELLOR Rachel Reeves was “pleased to tell” the Labour party conference that “thanks to our Covid corruption commissioner, almost £400m has now been recovered for taxpayers that had been lost to Covid fraud” (cue applause).
The Treasury explains this is made up of £186m in the year to this March from measures such as preventing companies with outstanding bounce-back loans from dissolving – so hardly cash back yet. And, since Covid corruption commissioner Tom Hayhoe didn’t start until December (eight months into the financial year), and as early as 2021 the government was reportedly blocking dissolutions, it’s not really thanks to him. In any case, the most recent figures show 51,000 companies have dissolved with outstanding loans while 74,000 have defaulted.