Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what the cost to the public purse was of each of the 151 charter flights organised by his Department to bring UK travellers back to the UK during the covid-19 pandemic.

The Government ran 186 charter flights, spending just over £40 million gross and around £15.2 million net, alongside £4.3 million, drawn from FCO Administration and the cross-HMG Conflict Stability and Security Fund, that supported the earlier repatriations from Wuhan, Peru, and cruise ships. The overall cost for each flight varied according to range of factors including the airline charter cost, take up by passengers, price capping of seats to ensure flights were affordable, facilitating ground transport to get passengers to airports in some countries, Government staffing, and contributions by other governments for flights that included outbound journeys. Not all of these costs are broken down by flight so we are unable to give a total cost to Government for each flight.