Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 9 March 2021 to Question 163295, what the annual budget of his in-house communications team (a) is currently and (b) has been in each of the last five years.

HM Treasury’s communications team budget, including all staff and running costs for the past five financial years is: 2016/17- £1,950,886, 2017/18 - £1,838,437, 2018/19 - £1,838,272, 2019/20 - £2,138,268, 2020/21 £2,706,529 (year to date). The difference in costs seen in the current financial year has been driven largely by the additional demands of responding to the coronavirus crisis including new insight contracts (reference numbers CCZZ20A32 and CCZZ20A50, available to view here and on the Governments contract finder website) to support the department’s policy response to the pandemic.