Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of reintroducing the Job Retention Bonus to help support employment after the furlough scheme ends.

The purpose of the Job Retention Bonus (JRB) was to encourage employers to keep people in work until the end of January 2021. However, when it was announced in December 2020 that the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) would be extended to the end of April 2021, the policy intent of the JRB fell away.

As the health situation deteriorated rapidly last autumn and winter, it was right that the Government instead extended the CJRS to reflect the increased number of closures that were expected over autumn and winter. However, the situation has changed moving into summer 2021 with the roll-out of the vaccine and the firm footing that gives to economic reopening. In this context, extending the CJRS further at Budget 2021, to the end of September, allowed the Government to strike the right balance between supporting the economy as it reopens, continuing to provide support and protect incomes, and ensuring incentives are in place to get people back to work as demand returns.