Covid Counter-Fraud Commissioner

Lord Hain Excerpts

Wednesday 5th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Livermore (Lab)]

I am very grateful to the noble Baroness for her question, and I absolutely agree with the underlying point she is making. I met Tom Hayhoe, the Covid Counter-Fraud Commissioner, last Friday, to make sure that I was fully prepared for this Question. I discussed his work with him, and he told me that he is considering a whistleblowing mechanism to enable the public to draw attention to abuses they are aware of. The work he is doing is absolutely in line with what the noble Baroness is asking for.

[Lord Hain (Lab)]

My Lords, can my noble friend ask the commissioner—and maybe take an interest in this himself—about the shortage of yachts for sale at the end of Covid? I was told by one of these yacht owners—this is not something I have ever indulged in—that he could not buy one for love or money. The reason was that people had been given, in his words, “a lot of money” by the Chancellor, particularly if they were running businesses, and were then able to indulge in buying yachts, to the point where they ran out of opportunities to do so. There was clearly something going on there.

[Lord Livermore (Lab)]

My noble friend clearly knows more yacht owners than I do—I have not discussed this matter with any yacht owners—but I absolutely understand the point he is making about the amount of fraud and abuse that was rampant in the system. The fact that the previous Government decided not to pursue so many of those contracts is not acceptable, which is exactly why we have set up these systems.