LONDON (Reuters) – The British government will be exposed to financial risks from its 372 billion pound pandemic spending for decades, according to lawmakers’ reports on Sunday that also said more than 2 billion pounds had been spent on unusable protective equipment.
In two reports on the response by Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government to the COVID-19 pandemic, parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said lessons needed to be learned before a promised public inquiry due to be held in 2022.
“With eye-watering sums of money spent on COVID measures so far the government needs to be clear, now, how this will be managed going forward, and over what period of time,” Meg Hillier, the PAC chair, said.
“The ongoing risk to the taxpayer will run for 20 years on things like arts and culture recovery loans, let alone the other new risks that departments across government must quickly learn to manage.”
The PAC highlighted an estimated loss of 26 billion pounds through fraud and repayment default from loans handed to businesses to help cope with the pandemic as an example of the ongoing…
