Analysis: Even the Treasury showed ‘little interest’ in who got handouts; now more than £4bn is missing
When it was announced in the first days of the coronavirus pandemic in March 2020, the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, described the furlough scheme as “as one of the most significant economic interventions at any point in the history of the British state and by any government anywhere in the world”.
Boris Johnson and Sunak were proud of a trailblazing scheme that would pay 80% of the wages of up to 11.7 million workers up to a maximum of £2,500 a month. “We have put aside ideology and orthodoxy to mobilise the full power and resources of the British state,” Sunak said from the 10 Downing Street lectern.
