20 December 2023 , 08:47
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Rishi Sunak considered giving millions of Brits gift cards or pre-paid debit cards in an attempt to boost the economy as the first Covid lockdown eased.
The then-Chancellor discussed the idea with officials at the Treasury in June 2020 according to documents published by the Covid Inquiry this week. In a witness statement to the Inquiry from Dan York-Smith, the Treasury's director general for tax and welfare, revealed a number of plans were discussed.
They included vouchers - in the form of a QR code for mobile phones - or pre-paid debit cards to spend in the struggling hospitality sector. Officials considered whether the debit cards "could be distributed through digital wallets" or in "physical card form", according to the Covid Inquiry documents.
But they found the option of pre-paid cards "presented substantial challenges and risks" and would have involved registering every adult in the UK. Mr York-Smith added: "Even if that could be achieved, there would have been significant risks associated with tens of millions of cards being distributed through the post as part of a highly publicised and marketed scheme, such as theft, fraud and loss."
The idea was eventually dropped by the Chancellor at a meeting on 23 June 2020. Instead, the Government opted for the infamous Eat Out to Help Out - a scheme said to have been dubbed "eat out to help the virus" by the Chief Medical Officer Sir Chris Whitty.
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Mr York-Smith admitted in his witness statement that while fraud and value for money were assessed "there was no specific risk assessment of how the EOTHO scheme might impact on Covid-19 transmission". But he insisted the decision to go ahead with the scheme "took place in the context of extensive cross-government lifting" of lockdown measures, "in which HM Treasury participated".
Appearing at the Inquiry earlier this month, Mr Sunak attempted to defend the scheme as the "right thing to do" as he faced a six-hour interrogation. The PM dismissed criticism of his Eat Out To Help Scheme as he argued many hospitality jobs would have been put at risk with “devastating consequences” if it hadn't been introduced in August 2020.
"In order to safeguard the jobs of 2million people working in the sector, you need people to go and use those businesses," he said.
Grilled on why Government scientists including Professor Sir Chris Whitty had not been consulted on the idea, Mr Sunak insisted the £840million discount scheme was a “micro policy”. Sir Chris is said to have privately referred to it as "Eat Out To Help Out The Virus", while Sir Patrick Vallance, who was chief scientific adviser, last month told the inquiry it was "highly likely" to have fuelled deaths.
But Mr Sunak hit back arguing they had “ample opportunity to raise those concerns between the announcement of the scheme and its implementation”. “None of them chose to do so in any forum that they were in,” he added.