Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps her Department is taking to help tackle covid-19 small business loan fraud.

The Government is committed to recouping public money lost in pandemic related fraud whilst also taking steps to provide value for money for UK taxpayers, working closely with law enforcement, counter-fraud agencies and commercial lenders. We are clear that fraud is not acceptable within these schemes, and businesses continue to be responsible for the loans they took out under any of the Covid loan guarantee schemes.

We are providing significant funding to the British Business Bank and the Insolvency Service to combat loan fraud, including £10.9 million for the British Business Bank over three years to boost their counter fraud and assurance programme. The Insolvency Service has a proven track record in handling complex fraud and financial misconduct investigations. By the end of March 2025, its work had resulted in more than 2,000 director disqualifications, bankruptcy restrictions, 62 criminal convictions, and more than £6 million recoveries related to Covid loan guarantee scheme abuse.

We have also appointed a fixed-term Covid Counter-Fraud Commissioner, Tom Hayhoe, to look at the issue of Covid fraud and recoveries at large, as we use every means possible to recoup public money lost in pandemic-related fraud. The Commissioner will be completing his work by the end of this year and will provide a report to be presented to Parliament.

In the interests of transparency, the Government also publishes Covid loan guarantee performance data, which includes total values lent and repayment data. The latest version of this data was published in August 2025 and can be accessed via the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-loan-guarantee-schemes-repayment-data-march-2025