Rishi Sunak's coronavirus bailout criticised for 'extraordinary’ lack of detail by Institute for Fiscal Studies

Rishi Sunak's latest bailout was criticised by a watchdog today for the “extraordinary” lack of detail about how much it will cost.

Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said: “This has been one of the most extraordinary things about the last couple of Treasury announcements: these are big substantial announcements — I mean we’re looking at £10 billion-plus, the sort of scale of a normal budget — and yet they brought these out without giving us any idea of the kind of money they are expected to cost.”

Media estimates of the costs are at around £12 billion, but the Treasury says no figure is possible until the severity of the winter surge is known.

Mr Sunak unveiled help for employers to avert a cliff edge of redundancies next month, which Mr Johnson said was akin to a continuation of the furlough scheme.

The Chancellor also announced help for areas such as London, where bars and restaurants have been stricken by the ban on household mixing indoors.

Labour today tore into what they called “gaps” in the bailouts. Shadow chancellor Anneliese Dodds said thousands who needed help would not get it, including self-employed people. “If people got a little bit of savings, which a lot of self-employed people do have, then they get knocked out of that support very quickly,” she told BBC Breakfast.

She said there was “a lot of confusion” around other elements.

Ms Dodds claimed Christmas would be undermined if the Government did not get a grip on rising infections by calling a temporary “circuit breaker” lockdown. “What we are looking at up to Christmas is an increasingly difficult situation in lots of parts of the country,” she said.

Asked about estimates that three million freelance and self-employed people have “fallen through the cracks”, Treasury minister Steve Barclay said there was a need to protect against fraud.

Referring to Christmas, Mr Barclay said: “I think few people expect it to be exactly as it would normally be because we will be living with this virus for some time…

“But, your point really was about the ability of families to spend Christmas together — that is something we all hope to be in a position to do.”

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