Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment he has made of the effect on employer uptake of the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme of requirements to disclose receipt of CJRS in businesses’ applications to sell goods or services to the public or private sectors as a gauge of business health.

The CJRS supports businesses to preserve employer-employee matches by providing a mechanism to pay the wages of furloughed employees.

The Government continues to monitor CJRS take-up, with HMRC's latest official statistics producing analysis of claims split by characteristics including employer size, sector of the economy, geography, age and gender.

The latest HMRC official statistics for November and December show the number of employments furloughed increased to 3.7 million on 1 November (when the CJRS extension launched), reaching 4.1 million on 11 November, and reduced to 3.8 million on 31 December* (*provisional figure).