Asked by: Sarah Pochin (Reform UK - Runcorn and Helsby)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment she has made of revenue lost to furlough fraud committed during the pandemic.
Answered by Dan Tomlinson - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Covid Counter Fraud Commissioner Tom Hayhoe’s final report to Parliament found many schemes - including Bounce Back Loans - were rolled out with huge fraud risks and no early safeguards – costing the taxpayer millions.
Weak accountability, bad quality data and poor contracting were identified as the primary causes of the £10.9 billion pound losses – which were enough to fund daily free school meals for the UK’s 2.7 million eligible children for eight years.
This government has already recouped almost £400m of Covid support cash.
The government has already actioned many of the Commissioner’s early proposals. These include:
Estimates of error and fraud for the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) are published at: Error and fraud in the COVID-19 schemes: methodology and approach (an update for 2023) - GOV.UK
Asked by: Joshua Reynolds (Liberal Democrat - Maidenhead)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he will review the current eligibility criteria for NHS-funded COVID-19 vaccinations, in light of the emergence of a new variant and rising hospitalisations.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation carefully considered the latest evidence on the risk of hospitalisation and mortality in specific groups, as well as cost-effectiveness analysis, in order to provide the Government with advice on the autumn 2025 programme. The evidence indicates that whilst the risk from COVID-19 is now much lower for most people, adults aged 75 years old and over, residents in care homes for older adults, and those who are immunosuppressed are those at highest risk of serious COVID-19 disease.
Therefore, a more targeted vaccination programme aimed at individuals with a higher risk of developing serious disease, and where vaccination was considered potentially cost-effective, was advised for autumn 2025.
The latest UK Health Security Agency’s (UKHSA) data in the national flu and COVID-19 surveillance report supports the current eligibility, showing that there is a strong association between age and COVID-19 hospitalisation rates. The highest hospital admission rate for COVID-19 in the report published on 27 November 2025 was in those aged 85 years old and over.
Currently XFG and its sub lineages, sometimes called the ‘Stratus’ variant, are the most prevalent SARS-CoV-2 lineages in England. This lineage is closely related to previous variants that circulated in the United Kingdom. At this time there is no indication that XFG causes more serious disease, or that the vaccines being used in the autumn 2025 campaign will not be effective against it. The UKHSA will continue to monitor both COVID-19 outcomes and variant prevalence as we enter the winter season.
Asked by: Sadik Al-Hassan (Labour - North Somerset)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care what estimate he has made of adult COVID-19 and influenza vaccination uptake in 2024–25; and what steps his Department is taking to strengthen communication of vaccine value to the public in response to hesitancy.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) publishes annual reports on seasonal flu vaccine uptake for England. COVID-19 vaccination uptake figures are published regularly during the spring and winter campaigns, as part of the national flu and COVID-19 surveillance report, and are available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/weekly-national-flu-reports
The adult groups which the vaccine is offered to includes those over 65 years of age, clinical risk groups, pregnant women, and frontline healthcare workers. Compared to the previous 2023 to 2024 season, uptake was higher in pregnant women. Comparisons cannot be made to the previous season for other adult groups, due to changes in the timing of programme implementation.
The Department works with the UKHSA and NHS England to deliver national communications supporting vaccine uptake. The UKHSA undertakes research, assessing public confidence, barriers, and motivators to vaccination uptake, and develops strategies and messaging tailored to different audiences.
Asked by: Sarah Pochin (Reform UK - Runcorn and Helsby)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, of the firms reported to HM Revenue and Customs for furlough fraud, how many (a) have been investigated and (b) remain to be investigated.
Answered by Dan Tomlinson - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
HMRC’s Fraud Reporting Gateway receives Human Intelligence reports on a variety of topics, including COVID-19 error and fraud, that are of interest to HMRC. This Fraud Reporting Gateway has resulted in 23,000 intelligence reports relating to the COVID schemes to assess, and a further 900 reports received from the Public Sector Fraud Authority.
Due to firewalls in place to protect human sources of information, the recipients of the intelligence do not know its origin. Therefore, once the intelligence is circulated, we are unable to directly identify and attribute yield generated from the Fraud Reporting Gateway contacts, or why an investigation was or was not started.
Asked by: Sarah Pochin (Reform UK - Runcorn and Helsby)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if she will publish a list of businesses that have committed furlough fraud but have not yet repaid the money.
Answered by Dan Tomlinson - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
HMRC has a “Publishing Details of Deliberate Tax Defaulters” programme which publishes details of deliberate tax defaulters on Gov.uk for a period of 12 months. Since HMRC began compliance on the COVID-19 support schemes, details of 195 people have been published for deliberately overclaiming CJRS and/or Eat Out to Help Out.
The latest publication was in November 2025: Details of deliberate tax defaulters - GOV.UK
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many (1) individuals and (2) organisations have been (a) investigated and (b) prosecuted for fraud in relation to COVID-19 funds since 2020.
Answered by Dan Tomlinson - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
HMRC have interpreted ‘COVID-19 funds’ as the ‘HMRC administered COVID-19 support schemes’, including Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS), Eat Out to Help Out (EOHO), the Self Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS), and the Department for Business and Trade (DBT) (previously the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy until 2023) administered Bounce Back Loan Scheme (BBLS), Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS), and Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CLBILS).
Although you have requested the data be broken down into individuals and organisations, HMRC do not hold the data at that level of detail. SEISS claims relate to individuals, whereas CJRS involves payroll, however, CJRS may also fall within the Income Tax (IT) or Corporation Tax (CT) regime. To add complexity, all charges for recovery of overpayments on the HMRC schemes are raised under IT legislation.
By the end of March 2025, HMRC had opened 53 criminal investigations into suspected fraud within the schemes and made a total of 99 arrests. There have been 4 convictions so far. Further ongoing criminal investigation activity has yet to be concluded within the criminal justice system and is subject to those timescales.
In this timeframe, HMRC also carried out more than 47,000 compliance checks using civil powers, where the amount claimed was out of step with other information. The risk that the claim was incorrect may have been due to a range of reasons from an honest mistake through to fraud.
DBT has worked with enforcement partners to tackle fraud linked to COVID-19 loan schemes. This includes the National Investigation Service (NATIS) and the Insolvency Service (INSS). To date, the Insolvency Service has obtained disqualifications against 2,595 directors, bankruptcy restrictions against 381 individuals and 82 successful criminal convictions in respect of COVID-19 financial support scheme misconduct. The Agency has also helped to secure more than £6 million in compensation related to COVID-19 financial support scheme abuse. Since 2020, NATIS has opened a total of 254 investigations covering both individuals and organisations. NATIS has secured 14 convictions up to November 2025.
Asked by: Jacob Collier (Labour - Burton and Uttoxeter)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has made an assessment of the (a) adequacy of the eligibility criteria for (i) free covid-19 vaccinations and (ii) access to covid-19 antiviral treatments for people with lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and (b) consistency of eligibility criteria used by general practices, community pharmacies and NHS 111 in England.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is committed to protecting those most vulnerable to COVID-19 through vaccination, as guided by the independent Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI). The primary aim of the national COVID-19 vaccination programme remains the prevention of serious illness, resulting in hospitalisations and deaths, arising from COVID-19.
The JCVI has advised that population immunity to COVID-19 has been increasing due to a combination of naturally acquired immunity following recovery from infection and vaccine-derived immunity. COVID-19 is now a relatively mild disease for most people, though it can still be unpleasant, with rates of hospitalisation and death from COVID-19 having reduced significantly since COVID-19 first emerged.
The focus of the JCVI’s advised programme has therefore moved towards targeted vaccination of the two groups who continue to be at higher risk of serious disease, including mortality. These are the oldest adults and individuals who are immunosuppressed. The Government has accepted the JCVI’s advice for autumn 2025 and in line with the advice, a COVID-19 vaccination is being offered to the following groups:
The COVID-19 chapter of the UK Health Security Agency Green Book on immunisation against infectious disease sets out guidance on the eligibility criteria above. This is signposted to all providers to ensure consistency. As for all vaccines, the JCVI keeps the evidence under regular review.
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence has published guidance that recommends several antivirals for the treatment of COVID-19, both in the community and for patients in hospital. This guidance sets out the eligibility criteria and ensures that patients who are at the highest risk of developing severe disease from COVID-19 have access to clinically- and cost-effective treatments.
Asked by: Helen Morgan (Liberal Democrat - North Shropshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will publish the full modelling and cost-effectiveness analyses underpinning the JCVI’s advice on COVID-19 vaccination eligibility for winter 2025–26, including the assumptions used on transmission, hospitalisation, mortality, and productivity losses.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation’s (JCVI) advice on COVID-19 vaccination in 2025 and spring 2026 was published on 13 November 2024. The JCVI met in September and October 2024 to formulate this advice, carefully considering the evidence on risk of illness, hospitalisation, or death as a consequence of infection, vaccine effectiveness and safety, and modelling and cost-effectiveness analysis. The minutes of these meetings, including a summary of the evidence considered, were made publicly available on the GOV.UK website in November 2024, and are available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/groups/joint-committee-on-vaccination-and-immunisation
The cost-effectiveness analysis of COVID-19 vaccination in 2025 and spring 2026 was carried out by the University of Warwick. This was published in the peer-reviewed academic journal ‘Vaccine’ in April 2025 by Keeling et al, including with a detailed description of the methodology and assumptions used, and is available at the following link:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264410X25002452
As per the JCVI Code of Practice, productivity losses were not included in this cost-effectiveness analysis.
Asked by: Helen Morgan (Liberal Democrat - North Shropshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation’s recommendation to narrow eligibility for the COVID-19 vaccination programme in 2025–26 on public health and the economy.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is committed to protecting those most vulnerable to COVID-19 through vaccination, as guided by the independent Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI). The primary aim of the national COVID-19 vaccination programme remains the prevention of serious illness, resulting in hospitalisations and deaths, arising from COVID-19.
The JCVI has advised that population immunity to COVID-19 has been increasing due to a combination of naturally acquired immunity following recovery from infection and vaccine-derived immunity. COVID-19 is now a relatively mild disease for most people, though it can still be unpleasant, with rates of hospitalisation and death from COVID-19 having reduced significantly since COVID-19 first emerged.
The focus of the JCVI advised programme has therefore moved towards targeted vaccination of the two groups who continue to be at higher risk of serious disease, including mortality. These are the oldest adults and individuals who are immunosuppressed. The Government has accepted the JCVI’s advice for autumn 2025 and in line with this, a COVID-19 vaccination is being offered to the following groups:
- adults aged 75 years old and over;
- residents in care homes for older adults; and
- individuals aged six months and over who are immunosuppressed.
Under their standard cost-effectiveness approach, the JCVI considers a vaccination programme cost effective if the health benefits are greater than the opportunity costs. The Department does not ask the JCVI to complete an assessment of the wider economic benefits of a vaccination programme.
As for all vaccines, the JCVI keeps the evidence under regular review.
Asked by: Edward Morello (Liberal Democrat - West Dorset)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will extent the eligibility for free Covid vaccines to people with other medical conditions in West Dorset.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is committed to protecting those most vulnerable to COVID-19 through vaccination, as guided by the independent Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI). The primary aim of the national COVID-19 vaccination programme remains the prevention of serious illness, resulting in hospitalisations and deaths, arising from COVID-19.
The JCVI has advised that population immunity to COVID-19 has been increasing due to a combination of naturally acquired immunity following recovery from infection and vaccine-derived immunity. COVID-19 is now a relatively mild disease for most people, though it can still be unpleasant, with rates of hospitalisation and death from COVID-19 having reduced significantly since COVID-19 first emerged.
The focus of the JCVI advised programme has therefore moved towards targeted vaccination of the two groups who continue to be at higher risk of serious disease, including mortality. These are the oldest adults and individuals who are immunosuppressed. The Government has accepted the JCVI’s advice for autumn 2025 and in line with the advice, a COVID-19 vaccination is being offered to the following groups:
- adults aged 75 years old and over;
- residents in care homes for older adults; and
- individuals aged six months and over who are immunosuppressed.
As for all vaccines, the JCVI keeps the evidence under regular review.