Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will take steps to ensure that local authorities that identify contact tracing as the optimum way to manage covid-19 beyond March 2022 are supported with the continuation of running contact tracing.

We have continued to provide funding to local authorities to tackle COVID-19 in their local communities through the Contain Outbreak Management Fund (COMF). The specific public health activities undertaken which are funded by the COMF are determined by local authorities in conjunction with Directors of Public Health and local tracing teams. No decision has yet been on made on the continuation of the COMF. However, in December 2021, we confirmed that unspent funds from the COMF can be carried forward to 2022/23.