Just when you thought the government’s record on recovering taxpayer cash lost to covid fraud couldn’t get much worse, the National Audit Office has revealed that they’ve recovered just £11.4 million of the £1.1 billion in covid business grant fraud. That’s a meagre 1%.

The government had previously said they hoped to recoup a quarter of the overall figure of lost cash – the new figures show they’re falling well below that on business grant fraud. Rishi also pledged the government would do “everything we can” to go after fraudsters. Clearly that isn’t enough…

A Business and Trade spokesperson said:

“This report confirms that our COVID-19 business grant schemes helped to secure millions of businesses and livelihoods through the pandemic – supporting jobs and the economy during unprecedented times. No amount of error and fraud is acceptable, and we are continuing to work hard to recover these funds where possible.”

This is the same line we’ve been hearing for a year now, including during Rishi’s leadership campaign. Clearly it isn’t happening. The report also points out there’s “little incentive” for councils to go after fraudsters either, because “all recovered monies must be paid back to central government.” Lost to the sands of time…