27 November 2025
(10.00 am)
Lady Hallett: Mr Wright.
Mr Wright: My Lady, the next witness is Robert Harrison.
If he could be sworn, please.
Mr Robert Harrison
MR ROBERT HARRISON (sworn).
Questions From Richard Wright KC, Lead Counsel to the Inquiry for Module 9
Lady Hallett: Thank you for coming along to help us, Mr Harrison.
The Witness: You’re welcome, my Lady.
Mr Wright: Now, Mr Harrison, you are the former Director General for Analysis in the Covid-19 Taskforce.
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And you’ve provided a statement to the Inquiry, which is INQ000656298.
Mr Harrison, you became involved, as we understand it, in the response to Covid-19 from March of 2020 onwards?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right.
Lady Hallett: Initially involved in formulating a national strategy for the response of the government; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s correct.
Lady Hallett: From April to October of 2020 you were a co-director of the International Comparators Joint Unit, which was looking at international responses; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: Correct.
Lady Hallett: But from October of 2020 to February 2022, you were the Director General for Analysis in the Covid-19 Taskforce?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And that’s really the period of your involvement in the response that I want to focus on. But before we get to that period, though, and looking at your involvement generally in the government’s response, is this the position: that your previous roles in government had not been focused on domestic policy issues, and when you started to be involved in the Covid-19 response, you found yourself surprised – is the word you use in your witness statement – by the differences in the way in which domestic policy was being approached?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that’s correct.
Lady Hallett: And can you just help us to understand what was different, what you thought was surprisingly missing, if that’s appropriate.
Mr Robert Harrison: So the thing which was most surprising to me, coming from the national security community, where there is an established practice and culture and an institution to bring together evidence in one place and present a single version of that evidence for decision makers, I was struck by the fact that on Covid, and in domestic policy generally, there was no equivalent to the Joint Intelligence Committee, which is the function that performs that task for foreign policy and national security.
And I recall asking people: what’s the domestic equivalent of the JIC? And of course, there wasn’t one. Although SAGE, as an emergency committee, was helping to perform that function for scientific advice, there wasn’t an existing institution whose role it was to bring together all of the different types of evidence and provide a single assessment of that for decision makers.
Lady Hallett: Right. And did you find that there was not an established mechanism for reaching an authoritative cross-departmental view that could then inform policy decisions?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that’s correct.
Lady Hallett: And what was the consequence of the absence of that mechanism in terms of how decisions were being taken, or being made by different departments?
Mr Robert Harrison: So the consequence was that it was very difficult for decision makers to know what evidence they should be using as the basis for their decisions. It might be the case that different departmental visitors might advance a particular view supported by – you know, by some evidence, but that might be interpreted differently from how another department interpreted that evidence, and it was very difficult for ministers required to take very difficult decisions under enormous pressure of time to determine whose analysis was the right analysis whereas the model that I was used to would have done that work previously and presented them with what was memorably described to me by a decision maker as “our best people’s best guess”, a common basis on which ministers could then debate what they should do and reach decisions.
Lady Hallett: So, analysis is done on a common basis and then, from that, policy decisions can then be made?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s absolutely right. And there’s a clear – in the world that I’m familiar with, there’s a very clear separation between those two parts of the process. And that separation was really strengthened culturally and institutionally as result of the reports into the Iraq War, especially the Butler Report of 2004, which recommended a much clearer separation, a much more independent analytical function. And the community that I have grown up in has embedded those practices in its institutions and culture.
Lady Hallett: And so did you find, in terms of domestic policy, then, that different departments may be receiving their own internal analysis on the same issue, and that that analysis may not always elide with the analysis being done with another department?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right. And it doesn’t necessarily mean that any of that analysis is wrong, but the process requires you to test one another’s conclusions and try and reach some sort of consensus on what we can say with confidence, what is not known, the amount of confidence and uncertainty that we attach to those conclusions, and then present that forward.
It is very difficult to do that in the same meeting where you are trying to take the decision itself because it is unclear what you are resting that decision on.
Lady Hallett: Right. And is that why, then, you say that it’s important that there should be a separation between the analysis phase, which is completed and presented authoritatively, and then the decision-making phase, the policy-setting phase, based on that analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, absolutely. So I think – and this is only my view, and based on my experience, but yes, I believe that is a better system. It also requires that the people doing the assessment of those various analyses have access to all of the relevant material, but if they do, and if they then conduct a good robust analytical process to test the various inputs and present conclusions, I think that provides ministers with the best available evidential base for their subsequent discussions.
Lady Hallett: Now we’ll come back to joint working in a while but just to pick up on that now, you said having access to the information; is therefore information sharing, open information sharing between departments important –
Mr Robert Harrison: Absolutely –
Lady Hallett: – feeding into the analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: – essential.
Lady Hallett: And what’s the problem if people aren’t sharing what’s going on internally, in terms of analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: Well, the objective is to provide a single holistic and authoritative assessment, all of the evidence which is available to us. So obviously if some of that evidence is not available to the people doing the assessments, it will be incomplete but also, if the decision makers arrive in the room ready to take a decision with a different view on what the evidence says, then they might, you know, they might disagree for reasons which are connected with assessment of the evidence rather than their judgement of what is the right thing to do.
So for all of those reasons, the two-stage process and complete, you know, the greatest possible transparency over evidence and analysis being available to the people doing that first part of the process is important.
Lady Hallett: Is there also a risk in that that decision makers can be coming into the room, arguing against a proposition, for example, on a basis that no one else is aware of, or is able to challenge or test?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes. That’s also true.
Lady Hallett: Right. So can we move on, then, to the Directorate General for Analysis in the Covid-19 Taskforce. The Covid-19 Taskforce, the Inquiry understands, was formed in May of 2020, and it was a unit at the centre of government which was designed to join together strategy, analysis, and coordination with departments across Whitehall to drive delivery; was that your understanding of the basis on which it was established?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, it was, and it took a little time before it had all of those characteristics but that’s – but at the time when I arrived in it in October 2020, those were its core functions.
Lady Hallett: Yes. And you arrived on 19 October as Head of The Directorate General for Analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that’s right. In fact as I’ve said in my statement, I originally arrived – I was originally appointed to a job which was called “Policy and Analysis” but we agreed between us to apply the separation that I have described, I gave up some of the policy areas which had been part of my predecessor’s role, and took on responsibility for commissioning from the scientific community so that we would institutionally apply that separation.
Lady Hallett: Okay. And the function of the Directorate General, was it firstly to provide integrated data and analysis to the Prime Minister and cabinet to inform government decision making?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that’s right. We did a certain amount of primary analysis but generally what we were doing is assessment of data and analysis provided by other departments, bringing it together and reaching conclusions based on it, and then presenting it in a way which was suitable for decision makers who were extremely pressed for time and also non-specialists in all of the relevant areas.
Lady Hallett: Was the idea that it would present one picture that was drawn from all the other subsets of data analysis that you’d received?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And so that the decision makers wouldn’t have to go through all those different sets of data and analysis, they’d get a comprehensive snapshot of the analysis, and then could make their decisions?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that’s right.
Lady Hallett: And did the Directorate General have multidisciplinary teams? So teams drawn from across the spectrum, health, science, economics, behaviour, social public policy, those sorts of things?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that’s right. I think all of the ones that you mentioned. I think some others were – we had a long-range foresight function to try and take a slightly longer – take a longer view out several months or, you know, even beyond the end of the pandemic.
I’m trying to think what else there was. I think – we had number of sort of functional teams who were responsible for creating the data products, setting up the data pipelines, processing, exchanging data with other departments. That was also indispensable. And what we’ve described there are the characteristics of the subteams but I think I should also mention that the human beings in that organisation were a very rich mixture, probably from 30 or 40 different departments or non-departmental bodies, agencies, and so on.
Lady Hallett: Was that a good thing, having that rich mix of people?
Mr Robert Harrison: I thought so.
Lady Hallett: And what were the benefits of bringing all those people together into your unit?
Mr Robert Harrison: It meant that we had people who understood the specialisms which existed in other departments. It meant that people came at the problem from different perspectives because of their previous professional background. It made it quite easy to create a culture of challenge. I can’t see – I don’t think there were any downsides. It was partly done by design and partly by accident because the way that the taskforce grew was by asking for help from other departments, a certain amount of direct recruitment, people often volunteered to join. So it wasn’t, it was not built according to a blueprint; it was created out of the various people who came together as the – the Directorate General for Analysis was formed from its predecessor sort of groups.
Lady Hallett: That capacity for internal challenge that was brought from the fact that there were people coming together from all sorts of different backgrounds, was that important, that the challenge was done internally before the analysis was prepared?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, or in the course of preparing analysis and assessment. Yes, it really was. And I think there were two things that really helped us. One was that the model that I have described, which I was trying to apply to this problem, was one which had explicitly – the Butler Report, and the Chilcot Report later, had explicitly highlighted the risks of groupthink, and that community had developed analytical methods or analytical tradecraft to test conclusions aggressively to try to identify assumptions that were being made or, you know, to try to mitigate that risk of groupthink. That was one.
Then the other was that the scientific community has a very robust culture of challenge. You know, the method is to advance a proposition and then test it. I’ve mentioned in my statement that we adopted a practice which was – which I first heard about in SPI-M, which was a sort of mantra of “Tell me why I’m wrong”: I advance my analysis and then I invite you to tell me why I’ve made a mistake and really, you know, try hard to prove me wrong. And if it survives that trial, it will be – you know, the conclusions will be stronger.
And we tried to embed that type of culture across my team and the analytical community within government.
Lady Hallett: And was that all designed to ensure that the analysis that was ultimately presented was as robust as it possibly could be, and really represented a single voice of the evidence, everything having been assessed, argued internally, as the analysis was developed?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, it both improved the quality of the analysis and improved the confidence that a range of departments with different views might have in it, because they had had the opportunity to debate and test and challenge one another on assumptions that they might be making.
Lady Hallett: I want to move on slightly to how you coordinated this analytical effort. Did you and your team, when you were stood up, have a general concern that policy was not being sufficiently evidence driven?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that would be – that was certainly a concern.
Lady Hallett: And was that – I mean, the way you put it was that policy was developed by triangulating between a number of considerations, of which the evidence was one?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes. And that is meant to be descriptive and not critical.
Lady Hallett: No, no, of course.
Mr Robert Harrison: But, yes, that is my impression of how people were trying to take account of evidence in the development of policy without the sort of institutional rules of the road that I was used to, and didn’t exist, perhaps, in other parts of government.
Lady Hallett: And did you also consider that it appeared, to you at least, that scientific advice was really being commissioned piecemeal by different policy teams and it was difficult to integrate it into a definitive analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, it was. So it was being – the commissioning was slightly chaotic and it was often at quite short notice, and a number of different departments would go to the same providers asking for slightly overlapping demands. So it was very difficult for the people doing that work to understand what government’s top priorities were with enough advance notice to be able to do high-quality work.
Lady Hallett: And so, to understand what you were trying to change, you sent an email to your senior team on 27 October 2020 – I just want to pick up on some of the things you said in that – that you should retain, firstly, a single page of key judgements; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right, yes.
Lady Hallett: And why have a single page of key judgments in that way?
Mr Robert Harrison: So that was a practice, again, that I’d brought from my previous job and previous experience that, recognising that decision makers were very pressed for time, they needed the analysis to be summarised at a manageable length, and that we should test ourselves – challenge ourselves to summarise the things that we wanted to say on a single page and then provide more detail, you know, additional layers of detail for those that wanted to go, you know, to go further. And, again, the practice that I was familiar with used those key judgements as the, sort of, foundations for policy.
So we wanted people to be able to say, “The analytical community has reached this judgement, and therefore your options are as follows …”
Lady Hallett: And you are also keen that there should be confidence statements with your analysis, so in other words, a way of communicating “There’s uncertainty here”, or “This is the strength of the evidence base for the analysis”; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right. That’s, again, a really important part of analytical practice and tradecraft. One is to talk about probability, and the other is to talk about confidence and to reflect accurately the strength or weakness of the evidential base for the judgements that you’re reaching.
Lady Hallett: Then the third thing you picked up in that email was that there should not be, in the analysis, policy recommendations?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: Just explain why you wouldn’t make a policy recommendation alongside the analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: So that, I suppose, is – that’s the Chinese wall that I was talking about earlier between analysis and policy.
It can be very difficult, after you’ve done the analysis, to stop yourself from, you know, going straight into recommendations, but it is a – I suppose, a definition of roles. The analytical community, you know, might well participate in discussions about what to do, but that is not their core task. Their core task is just to describe as objectively as possible what the evidence says. And that is then the end of their – you know, their – their function.
Another team will then develop options for ministers, and ministers are responsible for taking the decisions.
Lady Hallett: Sorry, I thought – forgive me – I thought you said earlier that you do the analysis and then you tell people what the options are. I thought …
Mr Robert Harrison: I beg your pardon, my Lady.
So, no, you do the analysis, you reach the judgements as best you can on what the evidence says. That’s the end of the analytical part of the cycle.
Lady Hallett: Yes.
Mr Robert Harrison: Your policy colleagues would then take that and also various other inputs including the ministerial steers which they might have had, and they’ll develop policy options for ministers, and the options will then be put to the ministers for decision. That would be –
Lady Hallett: So your earlier comment that basically you combine the two teams, the analytical part and then others develop the options.
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right, yes, exactly.
Lady Hallett: Thank you.
Mr Robert Harrison: So within the taskforce typically the analytical team would present the conclusions, pass it on to the policy and strategy team who would write their papers laying out for ministers what their options are, referring to the evidence summarised in our analysis.
Mr Wright: Just to complete that, and the two things would go together into this one-page judgement: here’s the analysis, here’s the option –
Mr Robert Harrison: No, I beg your pardon –
Lady Hallett: I think that was the question her Ladyship was driving at.
Lady Hallett: Yes.
Mr Robert Harrison: So the key judgements or key insights that I am talking about would be the final conclusions from the analytical part of the process, and they could then be written into policy papers, they might be presented as an annex to the policy papers, but those are the – they are the terminal point of the analytical part of the process.
Lady Hallett: Thank you. I have it.
Mr Wright: Thank you.
Now, I accept there’s an element of me asking you to mark your own homework here but how successful do you think that approach was as you implemented it in the autumn of 2020 going forwards?
Mr Robert Harrison: So I think it took us some time, honestly. I mean, at that particular moment it was a very difficult point in the pandemic response. You will know that we were, I think I said, I think it was in my second week that we went into the second lockdown. While we were trying to develop this slightly different way of working, daily demands on the teams and everybody in them continued, and a number of these cultural changes were quite different to the way that many officials were used to working and it wasn’t natural.
So there was quite –
Lady Hallett: Sorry, can just jump in there. Can you just expand on that? What was the cultural barrier to that way of working, if you like?
Mr Robert Harrison: So I mean, one we’ve already described, which is the sort of this very clear separation that I have described, which is practice in the national security community, is not common practice in the rest of government, and it requires, you know, it requires a bit of learning and calibration. And then I think that most analysts in domestic departments would say that they don’t feel that they are peers with their policy colleagues, that they are rather service providers. And one of the things that I was trying to do was to encourage them to be more independent and assertive with their policy colleagues, and when you’re being more independent and assertive, at a time when everybody is under pressure, it’s, you know, it causes a bit of grinding of the gears.
And it genuinely took some time.
Also, many of the parts of the process that I’ve described all had to be set up from scratch. So we had to establish what was going to be our, you know, our core products, how were we going to present the conclusions? The availability of data had improved significantly, but was not perfect. There was no existing institution where departments would come together and debate analytical conclusions as there was with the Joint Intelligence Committee and there was no institution that would be understood by all departments to carry authority, you know, for its judgements to carry authority.
So all of that had to be built.
Lady Hallett: Yes, I’m sorry to cut in but I obviously want to cover a lot of ground with you. So can we look at how you built that. I think you set up the Heads of Analysis group in November 2020; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And the Heads of Analysis group brought together the representatives from the Treasury, Office for National Statistics, Department of Health, scientific advice; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right, yeah.
Lady Hallett: And you describe that as having a central objective to help align the analytical effort across government; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And there were weekly meetings of these analytical units from across government to try and coordinate analysis; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right. We had a senior meeting every week or at times of lower pressure, maybe every two weeks, and we had working-level meetings often daily to make sure that the analytical effort remained aligned.
Lady Hallett: Thank you. And you were moving to a model that brought the SAGE advice within the analysis of economic and societal factors; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right. What we were trying to understand is what would be most useful to policymakers and decision makers to identify the questions that they would need answered to be able to take good decisions and then to commission centrally sources of data, sources of scientific advice, analysis in other departments with sufficient notice for that to be done to a high standard and also, then, pass through a process which would allow us to debate and reach collective judgements.
Lady Hallett: And you’ve described it as trying to create a high-trust analytical bubble; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: So high trust as in those making the decisions can trust the analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: So I actually meant something slightly different.
Lady Hallett: Well, you tell us what you meant – (overspeaking) –
Mr Robert Harrison: So again, one of the things which I noted was, you know – a difference between the environment that I was used to and the environment that I was in was that levels of trust were lower, and I think that was very evident during the autumn of 2020, some of the – the evidence of lack of trust between the political community and the scientific advisers was evident in the press. And in a low-trust environment it’s very difficult to share freely and debate conclusions in the way that I’ve described.
So what I tried to help institute was what we described as the analytical bubble where we would create a high-trust bubble within maybe a lower-trust environment and we agreed with analysts from other departments and the scientific community that within that bubble we would debate everything freely, we’d share everything and it would be entirely open but we would not share outside that bubble until we had reached our conclusions and we were able to present those conclusions to, you know, to all departments and to ministers collectively. So it was trying to create an environment in which a greater degree of freedom, freedom to share, was possible.
Lady Hallett: I see. So it’s trust internally, essentially, that everyone within the bubble is encouraged to share their views, debate, contribute?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, and a really important part was on – on the part of the Cabinet Office team, was to tell analysts and advisers outside government what the government was trying to achieve and what options were and weren’t plausible. So that was obviously potentially very sensitive. If it had leaked it would have been very damaging, it would have been certainly very damaging for the type of model that I was trying to create, but we felt, I felt, that it was important that everybody who was trying to advise the government understood what it was trying to do, and that if we were clear that we were sharing in confidence for that purpose we would, you know, nothing would leak and I don’t recall any significant leaks from within that analytical bubble.
Lady Hallett: And did those steps, some of which you’ve just outlined for us, did they improve, in your view, the quality of the output from the Directorate General of Analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, I think they did but I do think it took a little bit of time. The experience of the autumn of 2020 was very difficult indeed, because of the external pressures and because the demands on everybody were so great, it was difficult to create enough space to build an alternative model.
But I think through December, January and February, leading to the publication of the – of the roadmap out of lockdown, we got to a very much better position, where we were able to develop policy and inform decision making on the basis of much higher quality analytical output.
Lady Hallett: A phrase you’ve used in your witness statement was that it became a “virtuous circle”?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: What did you mean by that?
Mr Robert Harrison: So, the model that I’ve described required changes on the analytical side, but it involved a really significant change with our policy colleagues, who deserve just as much credit for how they – they worked with the analytical community. It required them to think a little bit further ahead about what they were going to need, accept that it would take longer than they were used to for analysts to provide work, accept that, you know, this principle of analytical independence, which again was not strictly – you know, was not a cultural norm at that time. But what I found was that as – as our analysis became better, and as it was better informed by an understanding of what the government was trying to achieve, we were able to produce stuff which was better and more useful, and, as it became better and more useful, policy colleagues became more and more dependent on – not dependent on it, but more – relied more and more on it, as ultimately did decision makers. And that is the virtuous circle that I was referring to in my statement.
Lady Hallett: Thank you. And you developed a number of different products, if you like, is that right, that would be present depending on what it was you were being asked to do?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, absolutely.
Lady Hallett: So there were analytical products that you were producing. They were to support policy development and decision making?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: So, for example, you might have products summarising the evidence at key decision points?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: You might have long-form in-depth documents?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: Or you might have short-form spotlight documents, which were, as I say, a short-form presentation, a snapshot presentation?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, on a single piece of paper.
Lady Hallett: Yes. I’m just going to ask that we just put up one of these spotlights as an example.
This is INQ000625666.
And this is a spotlight on the impact of the pandemic on the economy from 3 March 2021; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right.
Lady Hallett: And is this a typical example of the sort of spotlights you were producing?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s a typical format, usually one page of text and some visualisations to follow.
Lady Hallett: Yes.
Mr Robert Harrison: And a confidence statement, as we’ve discussed.
Lady Hallett: So if we just go to the first page, that, in a single page, sets out the snapshot, if you like, the spotlight on the issue?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: There is, at the bottom there, a comment about widespread uncertainty and so on and so forth, a caveat, if you like.
Mr Robert Harrison: So that’s not so much a caveat; that’s usually – so the – the format of these is: a chunk in bold at the top, bottom line up front, which is “If you read nothing else, read this” –
Lady Hallett: Right.
Mr Robert Harrison: – four or five – four or five points, and then the opportunity for the analyst to say what they think about it and why it might be useful, the “So what”, if you like.
Lady Hallett: Okay. So if we look at the top part there that’s in bold, that’s the “If you’re going to read anything, read this”?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And we see there:
“The pandemic and associated NPIs have driven the deepest recession in three centuries. There has been significant economic disruption …”
It goes on:
“After a partial recovery during the summer, tighter restrictions and ongoing uncertainty are suppressing economic activity …”
But then, on the last page, if we just go to that, just to pick up on that, so page 3, we’ve got the Confidence Statement.
Would these always be based on the same scales, so that people began to know what they were looking at?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that was a – you know, some were – a scale from high to low, colour coded, and some explanatory comments.
Lady Hallett: Yes.
Mr Robert Harrison: And the source documents referenced, as you can see in the section above.
Lady Hallett: Thank you. So that’s a good example of a spotlight.
You were also producing scenario documents where you would set out a range of plausible future scenarios; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, absolutely.
Lady Hallett: And then also producing papers that were designed to challenge consensus. Can you just expand a little on that and explain what you mean by that.
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes. So, obviously we did a lot of work to commissions from policy colleagues or from ministers, but we also wanted to flag things that we thought were important that might not get the attention that they needed because people were focused on one particular part of the problem. So I think I’ve mentioned in my statement one or two examples. One that I recall very well was a concern that because our principal concern was NHS capacity, we were generally focused on hospital admissions as – what I’ve described as the objective function. But, of course, getting Covid was itself a bad thing even if it didn’t take you to hospital: it increased the risks of Long Covid, it increased the risks of workforce absences. You know, there were various negative things associated with infection short of hospitalisation, and we wanted to make sure, as the government considered how it was going to open up, that those things were also considered. Bearing in mind that by that stage we were opening up, with quite a well vaccinated – or high levels of immunity in the population, we thought it was nevertheless important to bear in mind that what was described, I think, as “mild to moderate sickness” was still extremely unpleasant, and potentially – you know, had risks attached.
So that was one – that was one example that I recall.
Lady Hallett: So was there an element of free thinking, then, in the unit in terms of producing those? That these weren’t things you were being tasked to do, but things that were considered to be important and that you thought you ought to produce a – (overspeaking) –
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, we felt it was part of our role to flag things that busy people might not have thought of but we thought were nevertheless important. So, as I say, a lot of our work was done to commissions, with particular decision points or other key moments, but quite a lot of our output, and especially the spotlights, were often used to sort of “Have you thought of this? This is an important thing.”
Maybe that would then provide the hook for a conversation with our policy colleagues about whether that thing needed a bit more time and attention and whether we needed to make any adjustments.
Lady Hallett: Thank you.
So those were the analytical products. You were also producing data products. Now, these tended to be a visualisation of data, with little or no interpretation or analysis; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right, yes.
Lady Hallett: And they were things like the Covid-19 dashboard, the automated daily data brief, and data packs for Covid-O meetings?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, and the slides that people will be familiar with from the press conferences.
Lady Hallett: Yes. Now, as you have told us, you were working across government, and I think you’ve already touched on this, that you would receive data and analysis that had been done by other departments, and then you would look to produce a sort of consensus view?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that’s generally true. We would occasionally do some primary analysis ourselves, but often what we were doing is using inputs from others.
Lady Hallett: Yes. So the relationship with those individual departments was important?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: So can I concentrate now, next topic, on the relationship with the Treasury.
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And I think your principal point of liaison in the Treasury was James Benford who was the Director of the Economics Groups; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right.
Lady Hallett: And in terms of the composition of your Directorate General, you had – a significant number of staff working for you had Treasury experience, either they were loaned by the Treasury to you, or they had work there; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right.
Lady Hallett: And you say in your statement that the Treasury did participate actively in cross-departmental – in the cross-departmental analytical effort; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right. I think what I’ve said in the statement is that it was a mixed picture but the best analysis that we did, the best and most balanced analysis was produced when the Treasury were most involved.
Lady Hallett: Yes, and you’ve described them as often the source of “valuable challenge”?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: But you say it was a mixed picture. It wasn’t always an easy relationship; is that fair?
Mr Robert Harrison: That is fair.
Lady Hallett: You put it diplomatically in your statement that “tensions arose but were managed”?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, and I think that was all part of the good news story. I mean, tensions were good and healthy, I mentioned James Benford by name, he was very often a particularly valuable source of challenge in an analytical community in which people from the Department of Health and its associated bodies were preponderant, and that challenge was extremely valuable.
Lady Hallett: Yes. And I’m just going to put up an email, INQ000625696, please.
This was from you to James Benford, 23 February 2021:
“The voice of the evidence is loud in the document and this depended on a huge collective effort across the analytical community to reach consensus position. But I think you have had one of the hardest jobs, as an often lonely voice. Your challenge – always courteous and constructive – has undoubtedly made the final product better. I’m hugely grateful to the Treasury team and to you for your leadership role. Having [the Treasury] fully on board has been a game-changer.”
And so fully on board, why was it important that the Treasury – and we’re focusing now on economic analysis that you were doing – why was it important that the Treasury was fully on board and what did you mean by “fully on board”?
Mr Robert Harrison: So it was important because we were trying to present decision makers with a balanced picture which took into account all of the factors that they needed to consider in taking a decision. Obviously, the impact on the Nation’s health was one, the impact on the economy was right behind that, and the range of impacts on our country and society also needed to be taken into account to be able to provide them with a balanced view.
It’s almost impossible to do that without input from one of the most powerful and important departments in Whitehall, and the principal department responsible for management of the economy. So their involvement was indispensable in our ability to provide good advice to ministers on their choices around how to unlock after that third lockdown.
Lady Hallett: Okay. I’m going to ask for part of your statement to be put up on the screen now. This is page 36 of the statement, it’s paragraph 124, I think. I just want to pick up on this paragraph. You say this, having described that the importance of Treasury to your work:
“The Treasury found transparency uncomfortable. It was less open than other departments, and demanded a level of transparency from others which it did not always reciprocate. This caused irritation amongst others in the analytical community.”
Now, you described earlier that relations were mixed; is that part of what you were –
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s part of the mix.
Lady Hallett: Is that because Treasury is always concerned about leakage of policy affecting markets?
Mr Robert Harrison: So I’m not sure, my Lady, I’ve never worked inside the Treasury but I think that was certainly one of the relevant considerations, and in preparing for today but after writing my statement, I read a number of the witness statements of the Treasury officials and that is a line which many of them take, that market-sensitive information needs to be protected and it is not always appropriate to share outside the Treasury and that Treasury ministers should take the decision on whether it is in fact shared.
Mr Wright: But from your perspective leading this team, you had tried to create this high-trust analytical bubble where confidentiality was respected and nothing was being leaked. So would it have assisted you if there was greater transparency and greater sharing from the Treasury?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, it would certainly have assisted. And a number of the other things that we were talking about within that analytical bubble were also extremely sensitive, including sensitive for markets, because, you know, some of the options that the government was having to consider had really significant economic effects. But I can say from my previous experience that, you know, the government is capable of keeping secrets and high-trust communities are able to work on sensitive material in the national interest without it necessarily leaking directly to the press.
So I understand the Treasury arguments and I really understand how before, for example, a major fiscal event it might be necessary for those, you know, the supporting analysis to be retained internally but –
Lady Hallett: And not published?
Mr Robert Harrison: Not published –
– (overspeaking) –
Lady Hallett: – (unclear).
Mr Robert Harrison: But I think that that particular reason is over-egged as a, you know, as a reason not to share economic analysis or at least the methodology for that analysis freely outside the department.
Lady Hallett: Can I pick up on that about methodology. You say in your statement that economic modelling – and you’re dependent to a large extent in your unit on the modelling that the Treasury has done, it’s feeding into you, yes?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: That economic modelling was not as transparent, in your view, or as robust, as other types of modelling. Can you just explain what you mean by that?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, so maybe I should mean from my perspective –
Lady Hallett: Of course.
Mr Robert Harrison: – it was not as transparent. But what I was – my reference point was the transparency that operated in the epidemiological modelling community where I was able to ask any question that I wanted, understand the methodology behind it, attend meetings with the modellers, ask them any questions, see the data on which the models were based, ask them about their assumptions, see those conclusions published as soon as possible after a decision so that they could be debated including by the general public.
I thought it was a very high standard of transparency and I did not see any comparable process with economic modelling where we often – or I often struggled to get hold of the modelling itself, and the methodology behind it, and relied on conclusions which were presented to me by colleagues in the Treasury.
This isn’t always the case but that was the general picture.
Lady Hallett: Just to unpack that a little, you found in other instances that the conclusion would be shared with you and the modelling would be made transparent so you could understand it, but that the Treasury would share, what, the conclusion but not tell you the detail of the modelling?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, so the latter was more common, that the conclusion would be presented, and sometimes it would be explained, but I often was asking for, you know, the actual model or the spreadsheet which had been used to reach conclusions which we were going to include in one of our products and –
Lady Hallett: Why was it important that you had and could see the modelling that supported a conclusion?
Mr Robert Harrison: So I suppose for two reasons: one is, as I’ve described, the process of reaching judgements in which you can have confidence involves testing all of the propositions and the process which has led to those propositions being advanced. And secondly, transparency is an analytical standard. You know, the government’s best practice for analysis in fact published by the Treasury in the AQuA book requires that you are able to cite the underlying analysis in any product, and for a team whose role it was to synthesise and make assessments across other people’s work before putting forward their conclusions, and you wanted to be able to have confidence in them and then be able to reference them accurately.
Lady Hallett: Do you have confidence even now that you were aware of all of the modelling that the Treasury was doing at the time?
Mr Robert Harrison: No, I don’t think so. And since submitting my statement and reading the other Treasury statements, I saw one thing which genuinely surprised me, which was the existence of an epi-macro model developed inside the Treasury, by the Treasury during the summer of 2020. That’s the first time I have ever heard about that and I checked with some former colleagues before appearing here today that that is a, as I say, genuine surprise. It is absolutely the sort of thing that I would have expected to be shared outside the department and made available so that it could be tested. And with other models that were put to us from elsewhere, I mentioned, for example, one commercial model which reached Number 10, we had a process by which we would then seek expert views on whether that model was robust, the purposes for which it might be appropriate, any caveats which might be placed on it, and I – I can’t say very much more than I was very surprised to find that in the course of preparing for today.
Lady Hallett: Okay. I think what you’re referring to is in the statement of Beth Russell. So I’ll ask that to be put up, it’s INQ000588226, at paragraph 335.
“In the summer of 2020, [the Treasury] developed a new epi-macro modelling and analysis for autumn and winner planning …”
And it sets that out.
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: So you were unaware that the Treasury was doing that modelling at the time?
Mr Robert Harrison: I was unaware.
Lady Hallett: And would you have expected to know that –
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: – in the spirit of openness and collaboration?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, I would. I would have expected to know of its existence and as soon as I knew of its existence I would have expected it to have been shared, the methodology to have been shared, and I would have expected the “epi” components to have been quality assured by the government’s epidemiological experts in the way that we did with other models.
Lady Hallett: And if there was that model and you’d been able to do that quality assurance, would that have generally assisted you in the Directorate General of Analysis in terms of providing economic analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: Well, it depends. As you’ll have seen from my statement, I’m still not yet convinced – I have not yet seen an epi-macro model that would have been something that we could have used with confidence during the course of the pandemic.
I’m not hostile to the idea, I understand its utility, but I never saw one which was sufficiently robust to support government decision making.
And more than one would have been required, because it was a – it was a principle of SPI-M, which – which I thought was a very sound one, that no single model was ever – could ever be relied on and that you needed the outputs of several models, debated by experts who understood them, to reach conclusions which would be useful.
Lady Hallett: But does this also – the fact that there appears to have been a model you were unaware of, does that go back to the point you made earlier, that it’s back to this problem of if that modelling has been shared internally, say with decision makers in the Treasury, they’re going into meetings about policy with modelling and analysis that no one else knows about, no one else has been able to quality assure or check or challenge?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And just to pick up on modelling, I just want to deal with this briefly, if we can. You’d developed an economic toy model; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: Um –
Lady Hallett: Not you personally but one had been developed?
Mr Robert Harrison: No, so we had – sorry, the word “model” can be used to describe everything from a very, very simple spreadsheet to a very elaborate epidemiological model. This was a very simple thing. It was – I would prefer to describe it as a tool which allowed us, by local authority area, to say: if restrictions apply across these local authorities, the amount of gross value added will be – under those restrictions, will be this proportion of the – you know, of the nation’s output.
So it was not – it was not seeking to model the economic impact; it was a descriptive, so that ministers could see, you know, what proportion of the country was affected by a particular measure.
Lady Hallett: Right. So it was a simplistic thing. But did you find that the Treasury were then running with that and using it in a way that it, as far as you were concerned, hadn’t been intended to be used?
Mr Robert Harrison: So that was something slightly different, so that was a – so the toy model which – which I refer to in my statement, and about which I was asked, was an epidemiological toy model.
So, because there were real attractions in simple models, and there were a number flying around, we thought that it was a sensible thing to do to create one within government in which we had confidence, with proper caveats on use, and then make that available so that people could – not – absolutely not to inform decisions, but to help people who might be unfamiliar with the concepts understand how, for example, vaccine rollout at different speeds might affect the path of the – of the virus, at least directionally.
So the principal developers were the Joint Biosecurity Centre, and they – we worked with them, so too did the Treasury, to try to develop this thing called the “toy model”. I think at one stage we had an aspiration to try to develop something similar, an economic toy model, but I don’t remember whether the thing that I have described, this descriptive tool to inform ministers what proportion of the country was under restrictions, was ever developed into something which was a – you know, comparable to the JBC toy model.
Lady Hallett: All right. I just want to move on slightly to – it’s a linked point about the Treasury not being willing to share analysis. I’ll just take an example of working from home, October, November 2021. The taskforce produced a draft spotlight that included Treasury estimates of the cost of working from home.
I’ll ask if that’s put up. It’s INQ000625672.
Yeah.
And we see there:
“HMT estimates that mandating [working from home] could increase this impact by an additional £11-18 [billion] per annum …”
Did you ask the Treasury for their analysis and the assumptions on which they’d based those figures?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, absolutely. It’s obviously a headline-grabbing figure. In fact quite literally, because that – those figures were published by Politico, sourced to an internal Treasury document, not – not actually citing it quite correctly. But we absolutely needed to have confidence that we understood the workings that had produced those figures before we could allow them to go to decision makers.
Lady Hallett: Sure. So this is a draft?
Mr Robert Harrison: This is a draft.
Lady Hallett: You’re wanting to know: what have you based that figure on?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And is it the position that the Treasury refused to share that figure with you?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that is the short answer. And we had a fair bit of toing-and-froing over this, and I spoke on this occasion to Clare Lombardelli, as the Chief Economic Adviser, about this particular issue, and she was able to share me some – some commentary, but not the workings for those figures. So I wrote back to her to say, without the workings, I didn’t feel that we were able to include that figure, and that we couldn’t stand behind it with confidence, and removed it from the – from that product.
Lady Hallett: So the spooking the markets argument doesn’t fly there because the figure had already been leaked, and you were just wanting the working?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, I mean, I suppose – so, yes, my Lady, absolutely.
It does show that there is a risk of sensitive information being leaked, but it hadn’t leaked from within this analytical bubble, it had leaked incorrectly because, as I recall, the figures were included as a “The cost of working from home would be this”, without mentioning that it was per annum.
So it was a – it was a sensationalist leak, but it underlines the importance of being able to – understanding how such headline-grabbing figures have been arrived at.
Mr Wright: And you expressed your frustration, I think, about that in an email to colleagues, if we could have that up.
INQ000625684.
You say there:
“HMT have refused to share the analysis supporting the figures below, and now backed away from quantifying the effect. They have instead shared a note which draws qualitative conclusions …”
And you say in the middle there:
“This is frustrating … not a totally unreasonable analytical position, given the high levels of uncertainty …”
And you go on to say at the bottom:
“This means, at present, there are no figures which either we, or HMT, are able to stand behind. £11-18 billion should be struck from the record.”
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right. So I do think it’s worth underlining what I say about it not being an unreasonable analytical position. If the uncertainty is very high, perhaps we can’t produce meaningful figures for ministers; we can just say qualitatively that this is the option which is going to cause the most economic damage, as well as having the highest impact on transmission.
Lady Hallett: Yes. You didn’t mean it was an unreasonable analytical position to refuse to share it with you?
Mr Robert Harrison: No. I think that the … in the model that I was describing, that would be an unreasonable thing to, you know, if you send a conclusion, you need to be willing to share the workings to support it. But it is – I have just had in my mind as I’ve been talking, it would be fair to say that that is not common practice. And that the sort of model that we were trying to develop is not one with which most domestic officials would be familiar.
I thought it was very striking, the consistency in the Treasury statements about it being a matter for ministers to decide what is shared outside the department, and I think it’s fair of me to acknowledge that most people would think that was an entirely reasonable position. And that would be common practice.
So it was not in line with what we were trying to do, but I don’t think that they can, you know, I don’t think that the individuals who were, you know, if people were put in a position where they were being asked to share with the Cabinet Office analysis which a Treasury minister had decided should not be shared, it obviously put them in a very difficult position – yeah.
Lady Hallett: No, understood. What you’re saying is that their position really reflected what you might call default ways of working in government?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: That the minister decides what is and isn’t shared?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, exactly.
Lady Hallett: But what you were doing in your Directorate General was trying to encourage a new way of working?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: And so there was a tension between those two things?
Mr Robert Harrison: Absolutely, and it was across the grain of the way that Whitehall is used to working.
Lady Hallett: Yes, it didn’t sit easily with business as usual in Whitehall?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Lady Hallett: Right. I think there were other issues with the Treasury also not being willing to have their analysis, which has informed your documents, described as their analysis; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right.
Lady Hallett: And this blew up, for example, with workforce absences in January 2022 as an example of that?
Mr Robert Harrison: Mm.
Lady Hallett: I’ll just ask, please, that we put up INQ000625693, page 3 of that, I think it is. 625693.
And we see there at the top, this is from the Treasury to you:
“References to ‘HMT analysis’ have reappeared in this slide pack – per our previous comments, this should only be referenced as ‘internal analysis’.”
So they didn’t want it being presented as Treasury analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: That’s right.
Lady Hallett: How did that sit with you?
Mr Robert Harrison: So that was not in line with analytical best practice as we were trying to enforce it. It’s not in line with the AQuA book guidance on analysis being sourced and referenced. So it’s something that I think we sought to challenge.
Lady Hallett: I mean, I think ultimately you were trying to manage relationships; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: It was – I was. And I’ve provided examples to illustrate some of the friction, but the point that I made earlier is really important. We were only able to do our job with the Treasury cooperative, and I recognised, that, as I’ve just said, sometimes the individuals within the Treasury were in difficult positions and, you know, subject to conflicting pressures, and I can say that the best work that we did was not possible, would not have been possible without their active cooperation.
So I did understand it, but I also felt it was my job to be enforcing standards across the analytical community, partly for reasons of analytical propriety but also for reasons of fairness, because it was a source of friction with other departments that if rules were seen to apply to one department but not to another.
Lady Hallett: So is this a fair summary: that the Treasury did cooperate with you extensively, and you couldn’t have achieved a lot of the analysis you did on economic issues without the Treasury, you would have preferred absolute optimal level cooperation which didn’t always occur, but that was largely, in your view, based on historical culture in government and you were trying to implement a new way of working, a new way of thinking.
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes, that’s right.
Lady Hallett: Right. Can I then use that to, in the time we have left, because I want to give you an opportunity to speak about the future and look forwards based on your experience, turn to recommendations that you pick up on in your statement, but just to found those with the fact that the Inquiry understands that there has been established a Joint Data and Analysis Centre, established in March 2022 in the Cabinet Office; is that right?
Mr Robert Harrison: That is correct.
Lady Hallett: And is that centre, or was it established, to really take forward the work that you’d been doing in the Directorate General of Analysis?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes. During the course of 2021, we wrote a number of papers to say there was a gap, we filled it, we should keep the thing that we’ve built and use it for other problems. Was the basic proposition. And the result of that was Joint Data and Analysis Centre, which is still in existence.
Lady Hallett: Is it in existence in a format, as far as you’re aware, or at a level where you think it should be or needs to be?
Mr Robert Harrison: No, it isn’t. So compared with the recommendations that I originally put forward, it’s somewhat smaller. The analytical – the Covid analytical team was about 100 to 130, depending on the time. I recommended a unit of about 160. Scaled to the requirements which were put to me as of today, I believe that JDAC comprises about 35 people, but really, it’s not the scale that is the most important thing. What I am really advocating is the model that I have described today, which was developed in another part of government, refined and improved on the basis of very hard learning, and then applied to the Covid problem with positive effect.
I’m suggesting that that model and that culture is applied. So JDAC is not a – does not have the level of independence which I recommended or that the Joint Intelligence Organisation has. I don’t think that its authority to reach judgements across Whitehall would be recognised in the same way, and I don’t think it has the power to require other departments to share their data and analysis in the way that I have described that I believe is important.
Lady Hallett: So let’s pick up on some of those issues. How can it have that greater independence and authority?
Mr Robert Harrison: So I recommended that it, rather than existing as a subordinate team within a policy unit, which is where it currently sits within something called the Economic and Domestic Secretariat, that it should be created as a self-standing unit within the cabinet secretariat, the part of the Cabinet Office that supports the Prime Minister and the cabinet, in the same way as the Joint Intelligence Organisation works alongside its policy counterpart but is independent of it.
And what I was proposing is an institutional separation of analysis and policy to match the procedural separation that I’ve described earlier.
It’s also important that the head of that unit is seen by senior officials across Whitehall to be an authority, to have convening power, and to for a body chaired by that official to be recognised as the place where we reach single authoritative judgements on which ministers can collectively rely.
Lady Hallett: And collectively rely, you say that the numbers have fallen, we won’t get into a debate on how many numbers you need at any given time, but collectively rely just in times of emergency, or in your view, is there benefit to government in ordinary times from having a unit with that independence and capability?
Mr Robert Harrison: I believe that it’s absolutely essential in ordinary times, and I’m not the only person who thinks that. It has been highlighted as a gap in the government machinery for many years by Parliamentary committees, and by, you know, others such as the Institute for Government.
Lady Hallett: And the power to access data and analysis, how do you suggest that that should be bestowed on that body?
Mr Robert Harrison: So, I suppose that needs – that needs agreement from ministers collectively that they recognise that, whereas they might sometimes wish that certain analysis is not shared outside their department, that the, you know, government works best when it is able to rest on – on the very best available assessment of the available evidence, and that there is an expectation that data and analysis will be shared, and then appropriately protected.
As I say, government can do that.
It is a significant cultural change to the way that ministerial authority and responsibility usually operates but I see no reason why it can’t be done, not least because it does operate that way in the foreign policy and national security community.
Lady Hallett: Given the limited resources available to government, probably Cabinet Office at the moment, any recommendation I make, I have always to be careful that it’s not something that’s completely and utterly unaffordable, otherwise nothing’s going to happen.
Roughly what do you think it would cost to have the kind of unit that you’re talking about, and is there any way that that could save money in usual times?
Mr Robert Harrison: So, my Lady, I think – I’m trying to look for the paper –
Lady Hallett: I think 16 to 18 million, was it? Sorry, I’ve a figure of 18 million in my head.
Mr Robert Harrison: It might have been a little bit more than that. I will try to find you the number.
What I would say is that – so, first of all, of the number isn’t the most important thing. The Cabinet Office is quite a large department, and the difference between the unit as it currently exists and the unit as recommended is only, perhaps, 100 analysts. So, within a large department, if it chose to, those things could be adjusted so it could be – move people around within the department or have people with different skills.
I do believe that analytical skills are something which government and the Civil Service are going to need in abundance if we are going to be able to deal with the challenges of, you know, the century that faces us.
But the most important part of my recommendation, my Lady, is free. It is to do with how the institutions work together and the expectations that they will work together to reach a common conclusion. Because there are many thousands of analysts within – within the government, and this is a way of enabling them to work more effectively together.
So, even if there were not a single penny for a single additional analyst, the rest of the recommendations around independence and having a single authority all stand. And as I say, they are – they’re not just views; they are, I think, empirically proven to have led to better decision making in the first – sorry, the second half of the pandemic than the first, and have been long tried and tested in another part of the jungle.
Lady Hallett: 18.2 million.
Mr Robert Harrison: 18.2 million. Thank you.
Mr Wright: Can I just pick up on one other question.
The Joint Data and Analysis Centre, it’s performing analysis sometimes based on other analysis and data. Does it have a power to direct which data should be gathered, and how? And if it doesn’t, should it have?
Mr Robert Harrison: So, I wouldn’t necessarily – so, first of all, I should say I am not absolutely up to date. After the end of my time on Covid I went to go and work on a different crisis and haven’t – haven’t followed how all of this has, sort of, played out since.
They certainly have the power to commission, and one of the most important things is to be – having an entity at the centre of government which is anticipating what government is going to need, and then making sure that it is connected to department – to data sources elsewhere that might be useful and, if there are gaps, commission new data sources.
So, in normal times, it’s not so much the power as the having a function whose job it is to anticipate what government is going to need. I honestly don’t know what is the current basis of cooperation with other departments and whether some of the things that I’ve described have been slightly overtaken by events, but I don’t believe that to be the case.
Mr Wright: All right.
Thank you very much, Mr Harrison. Those are my questions.
My Lady, I think there is one …
Lady Hallett: There is.
Ms Beattie, who is just there.
Questions From Ms Beattie
Ms Beattie: Thank you.
Mr Harrison, I ask some questions on behalf of National Disabled People’s Organisations.
In your statement you explain that you worked extensively with people outside government, including academics on SAGE and at subgroups, two expert advisory groups, and others, who in fact had no formal advisory relationship with government, and that was to explore whether they had analytical tools, models, or other approaches from which you might benefit in your work.
Did that consultation, which sounds like it was fairly extensive, include any consultation with Disabled People’s Organisations, being organisations that are majority led, staff and governed by disabled people, as distinct from charities, or disabled people?
Mr Robert Harrison: So I suppose I should answer your question in two parts. The first is whether any of the formal advisory groups considered and represented the interests of disabled people, and the other is whether, in my own slightly magpie-like searching for things that might be useful, I had any contact with disabled groups.
So, on the latter, the answer is no, I didn’t. I didn’t. I was monitoring, in addition to things which were coming at me, some of the analysis which was being done by members of the general public or other organisations, and circulated on Twitter, based on government data and – but I don’t remember seeing anything produced by a group representing disabled people which – which I saw and thought: that’s really useful, we should bring it inside government.
What I can say is that one of the issues which we, as analytical community, focused on consistently was the impact on groups who might suffer cumulative disadvantage as a result of the pandemic and the government’s responses to it, focusing particularly on those people who might be affected by all of the negative effects of infection. You know, serious ill health, long-term ill health, economic deprivation, and so on and so on.
And I do recall that disabled people featured as one of the constituencies that might have suffered from those cumulative impacts, and we did our best in our analytical products to represent that to decision makers.
Ms Beattie: And I think, on that cumulative impact, in your statement you’ve referred, for example, to some of the analytical tools looking at that, I think you were able to consult sources such as the ONS and Public Health England?
Mr Robert Harrison: Yes.
Ms Beattie: And you’ve described already in your evidence the benefits of having a rich data picture and a mix of sources and perspectives, and how that improved the quality of the analysis that you were able to do.
Mr Robert Harrison: Mm.
Ms Beattie: Would that analysis, do you think, have benefited from input from representative organisations who would have had, whether it was qualitative or quantitative sources of data and perspectives, to contribute to supplement those other sources?
Mr Robert Harrison: So I’m sure that it would have done. And wherever we engaged with group that was taking a different analytical approach, it was always valuable, and we did our best to consider whether it was something which we then wanted to bring inside the analysis that we were doing within government and sometimes we did and sometimes we didn’t.
And I don’t think that there was any particular reason why, in this occasion, we didn’t – the reason was I didn’t come across an analysis which sparked my interest so that we had, you know, taken the opportunity to follow up and, if an infinite amount of time had existed, we might have had a more systematic approach of outreach to groups and to individuals who might have other approaches. So we tried to seek the widest possible range, but by no means was it complete.
Ms Beattie: So going forward –
Lady Hallett: No, I’m sorry, we’ve been there, Ms Beattie. I’ve got the point.
Thank you very much indeed, Mr Harrison. I’m really grateful. I think in your statement you refer to some of the long hours that you and your team were working. They sound like extraordinary times. I mean, working throughout the night on consecutive nights, it must have been really tough for you and your team. So thank you for all that you did to try to ensure that things were improved and to provide good quality data analysis for decision and policymakers. So thank you very much indeed for your help –
The Witness: Thank you, my Lady.
Lady Hallett: – and for what you did during Covid.
The Witness: Thank you.
Lady Hallett: Very well, I shall return at 11.35.
(11.19 am)
(A short break)
(11.35 am)
Lady Hallett: Ms Wilson.
Ms Wilson: My Lady, may I please call Mr James Benford.
Mr James Benford
MR JAMES BENFORD (affirmed).
Questions From Counsel to the Inquiry
Lady Hallett: Sorry if we kept you waiting.
The Witness: That’s okay.
Ms Wilson: Mr Benford, you are the former director of the Economics Group within HM Treasury; is that correct?
Mr James Benford: That’s right.
Counsel Inquiry: And you’ve provided a statement to the Inquiry dated 3 October 2025, with reference number INQ000588207.
Can you confirm if that statement is true to the best of your knowledge and belief.
Mr James Benford: It is.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.
As I understand it, the Treasury uses a group structure to organise its work, with the Economics Group being one of 13 groups; is that correct?
Mr James Benford: That’s right.
Counsel Inquiry: And the core work of the Economics Group is to provide ministers with analysis and ethnic minorities of the macroeconomic picture and developments of the UK economy; is that correct?
Mr James Benford: That’s right.
Counsel Inquiry: And it also advises on the implications of the government’s economic strategy?
Mr James Benford: That’s right.
Counsel Inquiry: To do that, I assume good quality, timely data is crucial?
Mr James Benford: Yeah.
Counsel Inquiry: And you explain in your statement that there were significant challenges with the timeliness of data during the pandemic; is that correct?
Mr James Benford: That’s right. It wasn’t that the data became less timely; it was that there was a demand for more timely data.
Counsel Inquiry: Yes. Can you provide some examples for us, please.
Mr James Benford: Yeah, I mean, on that, I should say that the UK data system is actually quite good. We have monthly data on prices, unemployment, GDP trade. Not all countries have that. But when the pandemic broke out, there was demand to track things in faster time and also with – with less of a lag, and that monthly data tends to come out the lag of around a month or so.
And, given that, there was quite an industry, actually, of looking at real-time indicators like restaurant bookings, flights, and public transport use, what was called mobility data, which is Google data on how many people were located in different types of location. Things like that. And that proved very useful for providing a timely indicator on what happened following the pandemic or change in restrictions very quickly.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.
Can we just break that down. So, as I understand it, traditional sources of data, very effective in normal times, even with a short time lag, but they were put under significant pressure during the pandemic because of the speed at which events were moving; is that right?
Mr James Benford: I mean, so those traditional sources of data were still really effective in the pandemic, and – and in fact even more useful to be able to track things month by month. Which is important, because – on occasion, people have said, “Why do we need these monthly indicators?” Even now. They’re really important. So, as I said, it was – it was more that people wanted to know even more quickly, and so there was a scramble find more information.
There was one issue I should mention which I don’t think I mentioned in my witness statement, it occurred to me just working through for today, that there was a decline in the quality of some of the household survey-based indicators, particularly those of the labour market, which I don’t think we fully realised at the time, it only became clear with the lag. And that – that was a problem, actually.
Counsel Inquiry: How did that issue with the household data survey impact of the work in the Treasury on assessing the macroeconomic picture?
Mr James Benford: So it was more relevant in the later stages of the pandemic as we were coming out of it, when there was a big issue to do with the number of people who were economically inactive and the UK was a major outlier relevant to other countries having more people not in work and not seeking work, and that was a feature of the household surveys.
And it kind of spurred a big search for why was it that these people weren’t working? Was it something to do with their health, or other reasons? With the benefit of hindsight, and I don’t think we knew this at the time, I think some of that rise in inactivity was probably due to poor quality in the survey data, which was therefore illusory, not all of it, but some of it was, and that’s come to light, actually very recently, as people have looked at the types of biases that one can get when the number of respondents to the survey drops to a low level.
Counsel Inquiry: And how do you think those challenges can be overcome in a future pandemic?
Mr James Benford: Well, one really important thing just on those household surveys is maintaining sufficient resources in them, and, you know, there were particular challenges – I mean, this is more from my current role, I should say, I work at the Office for National Statistics now and there were particular challenges as we came out of the pandemic due to just a general lack of availability of labour, and that hurt the ONS because it didn’t have interviewers, and that then had an impact on the survey.
Once the ONS responded and put more interviewers out there the quality of the survey recovered, and I think we’ve learnt from that that probably, when the number of people responding to that survey dropped, it probably wasn’t measuring inactivity fully correctly.
Counsel Inquiry: Just going back to the point you mentioned a moment ago about the significant work the Treasury had done to try to obtain novel data sources –
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: – to improve that real-time data.
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: Do you think there’s a benefit in working on that further so that there is better preparedness for a future pandemic?
Mr James Benford: Definitely. So I mean, there’s a number of parts to that. So I’d say actually those novel data sources came thorough quite readily, and a number of companies should be congratulated for how willing they were to put them together and help with the demands at the time, and it was really quite broad, not just mobility, but things like card spending data too. One issue in general with those types of data sets can be the need to have robust what’s called data pipelines to manage the flows of data, and the initial approaches through the pandemic was really quite ad hoc.
It’s the case now that many of those data sets have actually proved useful for measuring the economy in normal times, as well, and so we work at the ONS, for example, to incorporate those newer big dataset methods with traditional statistics to improve those statistics, both their timeliness and also their comprehensiveness, and yeah, that’s an area where it’s really important to have quite a deliberate, focused strategy.
Counsel Inquiry: And as part of any future data strategy, would you agree that building and – maintaining and building on those established pipelines is essential?
Mr James Benford: Yes, I would. I mean, one thing I would just note on, on that, is it is costly to bring data together, and it’s costly to maintain those data pipelines, so they’re of good quality. And there are often, in some cases, restrictions on how data can be moved, moved around and how it can be used that relate to the initial legal ground on which it was collected. That’s costly too.
So I go through that just to say that this is an area where it’s really important to prioritise and really have focused use cases.
Counsel Inquiry: Yes.
Mr James Benford: There can be real dangers if you just try and bring all the data together without being very clear on what you’re doing it for and making sure you’re focused on the most valuable things. And that’s an area where I think the national data strategy and what’s now called the National Data Library has a really important role to play to identify the biggest priorities for enhancing data.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you. Can I now move to ask you about data science capabilities at the Treasury?
Mr James Benford: Sure.
Counsel Inquiry: Firstly, why are such capabilities important in a crisis like a pandemic?
Mr James Benford: Essentially because they help you draw conclusions rapidly and efficiently from a wide range of sources, and particularly to be able to deal with very large data sets quickly and effectively, and that’s exactly what we needed to do in the pandemic.
Counsel Inquiry: So it helps a department be more agile to any fast-developing situation?
Mr James Benford: More agile but also more efficient, because you can automate quite a lot of the work you’d otherwise need to do manually, which – it does allow you to do things more quickly but it does also allow you to do more things.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.
Dr Tetlow, whose report you have been provided with, observed in her report that the Treasury, on the eve of the pandemic, had very few people employed as data scientists and she described their capabilities as almost non-existent.
Now, you took post in November of 2020. What was your view on the Treasury’s capabilities at the time you took office?
Mr James Benford: So it did have capability. One thing I was surprised to find, actually, was the Treasury had a quite modern data platform on the cloud and not many organisations actually had that at that point in time and some don’t even have that today. So it did have that capability, and that’s something that’s quite hard to set up. So those foundations were there.
There was an active coding community, with numbers of people working in code to do their work.
What was missing was two things: there was no centre of excellence for data science to be a driving force, and there was no strategy for how it would be used across the department as a whole.
And that’s one reason, and perhaps we’ll come on to this, why my line manager at the time Clare Lombardelli the chief economic adviser, launched a review, I think just after I joined, to establish how the Treasury should grow its data science capabilities.
Counsel Inquiry: And what was the result of that review?
Mr James Benford: So I should say I didn’t lead that review but I did closely steer it. It was another member of staff of the Treasury who led that review. But I was given the task of taking forward its recommendations.
The main thing was to establish a data science hub in the Treasury and also to establish a new role of Chief Data Officer.
So I took forward that, I hired for that Chief Data Officer role and helped that person build up a team. One part was focused on data engineering. That’s the pipelines that I talked about, making sure those were as effective as possible. Another part was focused on the data science, which is drawing conclusions and insights from that data.
The initial vision for the hub was very much a minimum viable product, which reflects the context. There was a lot of pressure on the Treasury’s time, not just Covid, but we had things like the consequences of Russia invading the Ukraine. And also the department’s headcount and my group’s headcount was shrinking, so it was only 12 people that we managed to establish. But it did – it did have a number of important results. So it’s helped the department more efficiently manage management information, corporate information, the flows of economic data. We built an economic data dashboard. It helps the department to – to allocate public correspondence, to the right place very effectively too.
There are number of important areas where it improved the work of the department.
Lady Hallett: Can I ask you to slow down. Really grateful. I’m a fine one to talk, because I talk very quickly.
The Witness: I will do, sorry.
Ms Wilson: The data science hub, how did the work of that hub contribute to the Treasury’s response to the pandemic?
Mr James Benford: So I don’t think it was fully established during the heat of the pandemic. There were data science capabilities more thinly spread that we could draw on. One particular thing we did that was quite important actually is, you know, particularly during 2020, and the autumn of 2020, there was still uncertainty about the impacts of different restrictions, and one unusual feature of the UK was that we had different tiers in place in different parts of the country, and so you could use that information to look at the impact in this region versus another region to work out the impact of those tiers.
That’s relatively involved, because we didn’t have GDP data for those different regions, but we did have this mobility data. And so we used several sets of relationships to estimate the impact of tiering on GDP as a whole through those – through those different loops. And we actually published that analysis in the – I think it was the – the February budget in 2021, and that was an important piece of work to have done.
Counsel Inquiry: So you say that the hub wasn’t fully stood up during the main part of the pandemic?
Mr James Benford: Yeah, we were still doing the review in that period.
Counsel Inquiry: When was the hub functioning?
Mr James Benford: So I – we hired – we work out the leadership first. So we hired for the Chief Data Officer I think in 2022, towards the end of that year. So it was quite – quite late. And that reflected the time to do the review, reach conclusions, and change departmental budgets to make room for the – for the hub. So it was quite late.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.
I want to move now to ask you about the production and then the sharing of analysis which is produced within the Economics Department. As I understand it from your evidence, the analysis is not just produced within the Economics Department and the Treasury.
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: There are analysts elsewhere; is that correct?
Mr James Benford: Yes, that’s correct. There’s around, I think – or there were around, at the time, 400 analysts across the Treasury as a whole. And there were policy professionals doing analytical work too. So 400 wasn’t the complete picture, I don’t think. The Economics Group was the biggest part, around 200 of that, but it wasn’t – wasn’t the only part.
Counsel Inquiry: Now, analysis from the Economics Group and any other groups in the Treasury was brought together, as I understand it, by the Covid-19 response team, which sat within the Strategy, Planning and Budget Group led by Dan York-Smith, is that right?
Mr James Benford: We did have a set-up where there was a Covid Response Team focused on policy, and then I had a role in both commissioning and – and drawing together analysis to feed into that team. The role in advising specifically on policy was for that team.
Counsel Inquiry: I just want bring up, please, Mr York-Smith’s interview as part of a corporate memory project which the Treasury undertook.
So INQ000652988, please. Thank you.
And this is the last extract of that, where – and I appreciate these aren’t your words, these are Mr York-Smith’s words. He states – it’s recorded, sorry:
“Dan reflected that they got more and more confident about deploying analysis as the crisis continued. There was a cultural thing around Economics Group waiting to be asked to produce analysis, and this shifted over the course of the pandemic.”
I just wondered if you could assist us with what the cultural issue was there around the production of analysis.
Mr James Benford: So, when I started in role, as you often do starting a new role, I did do just a soft review for myself of what people thought of the group, and – both externally to the group and within it, and we established a new strategy coming out of that review. And one part of – one leg of that, one important leg of that, was to be more proactive and to, you know, identify and partner with policy teams, identify their needs and then try to meet their needs proactively rather than wait to be asked.
I did listen to the previous hearing too. I did – do recognise – and I should also say I was new to the Civil Service through this period. Most of my career has been at the Bank of England before that point. And I did recognise what Rob Harrison described as – perhaps as subservience of analysis to policy, and that – which gave rise a bit to that waiting to be asked, and sought to address that by being more proactive both in figuring out – anticipating the needs, but also just taking analytical results and putting them into policy discussions where there was a need to do so that we had identified.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.
Moving on now to what you describe as another – as a core responsibility of the Economics Group, can we look at your statement, please.
INQ000588207.
Amongst this is the core objectives, and you describe there, one of them is:
“To work collaboratively with colleagues across HM Treasury, Whitehall and beyond, both to support a shared analysis and assessment of key macroeconomic issues, [but also] to ensure [those are] well communicated and understood.”
I think we heard from Mr Harrison this morning that sharing of analysis was essential. Do you share that view?
Mr James Benford: I do, for two reasons. One, it’s only through sharing that you bring different perspectives together, and you’ll get a stronger result as a – as a consequence of that. And it’s only through sharing that you get the impact that the analysis deserves.
Counsel Inquiry: Focusing on economic analysis in particular, is there a benefit to sharing economic analysis with other departments, to help them understand the challenges which were faced by the Treasury?
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: What might be the challenges or barriers with sharing of economic analysis?
Mr James Benford: The main one is, it’s often intrinsically linked with the discussions around the development of economic policy, and sometimes many of those policy measures, and indeed things like the overall fiscal position of the government, which – which often flows from the state of the economy, are highly sensitive matters, particularly in the run-up to fiscal events.
And one thing that perhaps isn’t always appreciated about the pandemic is every major change in restrictions was a fiscal event, because you had to change support to the economy to go with it, and that – that made things a bit more difficult than they would otherwise have been.
Not in all cases. We had very good arrangements for sharing very sensitive information with the Office for Budgetary Responsibility and shared many long and detailed papers there. I think they would say that they wouldn’t be able to fulfil their role without the work that was provided to the – from the Treasury to them. But we didn’t share as freely in real time with others.
Counsel Inquiry: What was different about the relationship with the OBR then, who you were able to share freely with, but not some other departments?
Mr James Benford: Two things I think would be different. One was they were an extremely trusted partner. We knew that none of the information would leak, and we knew – we were very clear about the purpose, how it would be used. It was going to be used in the next fiscal outlook or something like that. So we knew what it was feeding into. I think those two things mark it out as a bit different.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you. We’ve heard from Mr Harrison this morning his perspective that the Treasury co-operated, I think “extensively” was his word, but also that it was a mixed picture at times. You say in your statement and I wonder if we could just bring this up, please, at page 33, at paragraph 100, thank you, that:
“[The] Treasury stepped up the sharing of analysis … as the structures and processes needed to do so became more sophisticated over time.”
Now, you say “stepped up”. Is that because you thought there was room for more openness, more sharing of analysis?
Mr James Benford: I mean, I think a few different things happened over time. So as time passed, there was more data available and more analysis could be done. So the available body of analysis to share grew. And so it was quite natural that more sharing occurred over time due to that. And then the Cabinet Office set up this new structure which was there to facilitate information sharing, and I really agreed with what Rob Harrison said about the need to build trust within that structure and some of this is a reflection, I’m not sure I really appreciated the degree at the time, but there really was very, very low levels of trust in some areas at that point.
And that –
Lady Hallett: Very low levels of trust in whom or what?
Mr James Benford: Both ways. Particularly through what I would refer to as the health community, health and science community, and the economics community. And it’s well documented in the press, and, you know, to be completely direct, I had come from the health community, I was working in the Joint Biosecurity Centre before joining the Treasury and at points I was quite shocked at how people treated me personally differently, because I was in a different seat. And at times, I think that went too far, to be honest.
I think that reflected that lack of trust, and you can only build trust with time. It takes hard work and a willingness to share. I think we did build that through the period that led up to the publication of the roadmap document, and that’s to Rob’s great credit. He set up the structures to make that happen.
I would say – perhaps you would say I would say this – but I think that roadmap document, by a great distance, is one of the best examples I know of of collaboration across government to produce a consistent evidence base and one of the best examples I know of of analysis in forming policy in a really, really commendable way.
Ms Wilson: Given you said you’ve worked in health teams and then at the Treasury, why do you think there were such low levels of trust during the pandemic between those teams?
Mr James Benford: Reflecting back, I would put it on the absence of structures to bring the two views together. And that’s why the structure which Rob established was so valuable.
Counsel Inquiry: Yes.
Mr James Benford: And I mean, you may be intending to come on to this, but I’ve heard it kind of asked sometimes: should there have been an economics equivalent of SAGE? SAGE was one quite big transparent structure, to gather scientific evidence. My view on that would be no, we should bring economic voices into SAGE both to be a member of it and to be part of the leadership of it, because it’s only by bringing the two perspectives together you get a stronger understanding, a stronger conclusion, and you build that trust. And there weren’t enough structures to build – to bring the two groups together.
Counsel Inquiry: And I think your view, as you set out in your statement, is that the Directorate General for Analysis would have been useful if it had been set up earlier? You were very much in favour of that structure?
Mr James Benford: 100%, and I think its important it’s not just kind of break glass in emergency, let’s set this up in a crisis, all times, because you need the relationships, you need the trust to be there from the start, if you try to do it just in the heat of the moment it’s really hard to do that because the tensions and stakes are too high.
Counsel Inquiry: It comes back to what you said a moment ago, trust has to be built over time and that’s in normal times and then it is effectively tested in an emergency like a pandemic or future crisis.
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.
I just want to ask you about one reflection of Mr Harrison’s set in his statement and this morning was that the Treasury found transparency uncomfortable, and that’s against that background of a mixed picture of engagement. From your perspective, did it?
Mr James Benford: Um, I mean, I think on this it’s quite hard to, with any organisation, to describe it as this uniform, slightly faceless body. There’s different parts of the Treasury. I know yourselves, and I agree with this, have commended really strong ways of working between the Treasury and His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, and that’s true from what I saw. So often, you know, it depended on the strengths of relationships.
I did read Rob Harrison’s statement, and the sense that he picked up from others that perhaps, with respect to economic analysis, there was a bit of a scarring effect after the publication of various pieces of work on Brexit, on the sharing of economic analysis, because of the view that they had been sometimes almost weaponised and quoted out of context.
I think I did detect that. I think I did detect that.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you. And I just want to look at a couple of examples with you, please. One is one which we touched on this morning, the toy model.
Mr James Benford: Yeah.
Counsel Inquiry: Which, as I understand it, was a very simplistic model –
Mr James Benford: Yeah.
Counsel Inquiry: – to be used by analysts to gain a feel of outcomes of the virus, including transmission and how vaccines might affect things like hospital admissions.
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: But its purpose was not to replace the more extensive, formal complex models –
Mr James Benford: Yeah.
Counsel Inquiry: – owned by SPI-M?
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: Were you aware of the models used within the Treasury when you were in post?
Mr James Benford: Yeah … yes. I’m not completely sure whether I would have seen all of its use because some of its use was outside my group, but I was aware of it. And I should also say on this that I encouraged the Treasury to collaborate with the Joint Biosecurity Centre to develop that model and we did actively develop it both at the outset and to include an extension of the model to account for different variants of the virus, because I thought it would be extremely useful to have a simple model to basically be a place where we could get to a common understanding of important factors that were under consideration.
Counsel Inquiry: So after it had been distributed amongst analysts, the Treasury did extend the model, but you thought for good reason?
Mr James Benford: So this bit is relatively complex. So a few different things were going on at the same time, and there were different types of extensions. So –
Counsel Inquiry: I don’t think we need to get out – I don’t think we need to get into the detail of it, but let me just put a document on the screen –
Mr James Benford: Sure.
Counsel Inquiry: – so we can see.
So can we have the statement, please, of Mr Harrison, INQ000656298, paragraph 109. Page 33, please.
I just want to put this perspective to you, Mr Benford. His recollection was that:
“It became clear that [the Treasury] had adapted and ‘built out’ the JBC model to show numerical outputs over a [long period of time] …”
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: “… without consultation with other stakeholders.”
So rather than the details of how it was extended, was it extended without consultation with other stakeholders?
Mr James Benford: So I now know which extension you’re referring to. There was a second extension, too.
So there’s a few things to say here. So this was in January 2021, and what the Treasury was trying to do at the moment was to plan the kind of outlook for economic policy over the coming years and to do that needed to have a baseline view of where the virus was heading over a long period.
That JBC model had initially only been set up for a short time period. So that’s the context.
Another piece of context, and you did get into this with Rob this morning too, is the Treasury had another model, it had this quite simple, crude epi-macro model that we had been – that we had available too, and we had used that in December and put together some general advice for the Chancellor based on that model, rather than the JBC model, and the conclusions we were careful to caveat and to keep qualitative, because I wasn’t comfortable with the strength of that model, particularly the economic side, actually.
Counsel Inquiry: Okay.
Mr James Benford: And so what happened – and this was the deliberate strategy – was we used that model and the JBC model to try to encourage the rest of the community to commission modelling over a longer time period because without that we couldn’t form a sensible framing for economic policy going forward.
Counsel Inquiry: Just on the epi-macro model, you didn’t share that model with Rob Harrison’s team, did you?
Mr James Benford: No, no.
Counsel Inquiry: Looking back, do you think it would have been beneficial to share that?
Mr James Benford: I’m not sure. So it was a – so when I joined the Treasury in November 2020 the model had been developed in the summer. There was an established departmental position not to share it.
Counsel Inquiry: Who would have made that decision?
Mr James Benford: I don’t know. I don’t know. Yeah, I don’t know. I accepted that.
The logic to that – and I think it does relate back to the, you know, experience during the Brexit period is – we weren’t very confident in the strength of that modelling, and we were nervous that, you know, Treasury having this model could get into a reaction, a disproportionate reaction, that would be a big distraction, basically. So our strategy, instead, was to build a joint model with the rest of the community and to focus on that, and to transition off that very crude epi-macro model to the one that you described. And that’s what we did.
Counsel Inquiry: So was it, then, that the previous public criticism about the analysis the Treasury had undertaken had created a more guarded approach to sharing and openness?
Mr James Benford: I – I don’t know. So, whenever that position was established, it was before I joined, I just accepted it. So I would be speculating, I think.
Counsel Inquiry: Going back to the toy model briefly, were you aware of some nervousness about the use of that model at the time?
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: Because if it stretched too much –
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: – or if it’s used in the wrong way –
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: – then you lose the model, don’t you? It can be taken away from everybody?
Mr James Benford: Well, I’m not sure it’s taken away from everybody. It’s more that, you know, when something isn’t robust – and I really subscribe to the view that Rob mentioned too, that it shouldn’t just be one model, it should be several – it’s not load bearing, you shouldn’t be basing a policy conclusion on it. So that’s why there was a view, which we supported, that we should be basing the final policy conclusions on the SPI-M modelling, which was more robust and extensive.
What the simple toy model was very useful for is understanding the impact of different parameters. And one parameter that was very important that was shown both in that toy modelling and in the SPI-M modelling, for example, was the starting value of R, whether infections going into a decision on what to do, if restrictions were increasing or decreasing.
And the model, the joint model we had available, was very useful in illustrating that point. And it was very useful also in making sure we did have the correct starting value for that parameter.
Counsel Inquiry: But a number amongst the analytical community perhaps were a bit surprised and a bit upset at the way the Treasury had used the model.
And if I can just ask for one document to be put on screen, please, INQ000196028, page 1.
And this was an email from Angela McLean, who had been part of the team to set up the model, to Robert Harrison. She’s saying there:
“… HMT changed the model after I QA’d [quality assured] it and I don’t know how.”
And we can see there the strength of her view in the following lines.
Looking back, and given the sense of feeling that the Treasury had done this without consultation with people like Robert Harrison, do you think that the Treasury could have been more open and transparent about how it had extended or adapted the toy model?
Mr James Benford: So – I mean, I think it’s more important to remember – and you can see it in some of the language in this email – that we were operating in a low-trust environment.
Counsel Inquiry: Yes.
Mr James Benford: And what was a relatively understandable need from one perspective, from another perspective was quite a becoming surprise. So we needed to know what would happen over a long time horizon, otherwise we wouldn’t be able to put together that budget in February, and have a sensible basis for working through economic policy.
We did reveal that to the community, and I can remember a meeting where I talked through it, and got, from a number of people, what felt like quite violent reactions, and we did work through that, and we agreed a basis for a way forward. And we got to a very good place, which was we would develop a shared commission for the more robust modelling, and –
Counsel Inquiry: And was the outcome of that – I think it was led by Mr Harrison, wasn’t it, and the directorate of analysis team – to bring together the different perspectives and work through it for a constructive solution?
Mr James Benford: Well, the outcome I remember at that point in time was to agree this joint commission that went to SPI-M.
Counsel Inquiry: Yes.
Mr James Benford: And that produced the more robust modelling, which – which, in the end, got us to what was a great roadmap document.
You know, it’s quite hard to replay it almost five years afterwards. We got to the right place. It was bumpy. It was bumpy. And, you know, if we’d had a kind of higher-trust environment, it would have been – wouldn’t have been so bumpy.
But, yeah, it’s quite hard to know if a different approach could have got us there more smoothly. I think a lot was to do with the low-trust environment.
Counsel Inquiry: Can I ask you very briefly about another example. Can we agree that sourcing and referencing analysis is best practice? I think it’s set out in the AQuA Book?
Mr James Benford: Yeah.
Counsel Inquiry: And that the purpose of that is to ensure that analysis is fully auditable and it’s clear who owns the primary analysis; correct?
Mr James Benford: Yeah.
Counsel Inquiry: We touched briefly this morning on an example around analysis on the impact of workforce absences?
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: And there was some concern about the Treasury asking for that analysis not to be attributed to them, but rather it to be labelled as government internal analysis?
Mr James Benford: Yeah.
Counsel Inquiry: I think this occurred at a time when you were taking a period of leave for reasons which we don’t need to go into.
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: But can you help us with why that approach might have been taken?
Mr James Benford: I don’t think I can, to be honest. I wasn’t there. Context is always important, and I don’t know what happened. When I got back, which was February 2022, after Omicron had – you know, the community had moved past that. I was aware that something had happened. I didn’t – didn’t dig into it, because we quite quickly moved on to the next thing, which was, you know, concerns, I think, around that time, around Russia invading Ukraine, so I don’t know.
Counsel Inquiry: Did it represent a departmental position about not labelling analysis as “Treasury analysis”?
Mr James Benford: I don’t think so. I wasn’t aware of that position.
Counsel Inquiry: Okay. I want to ask you finally briefly about the Treasury’s engagement with external experts.
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: As I understand it, there were some talks and presentations given by external experts?
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: But there was no formal forum for testing ideas, receiving constructive feedback on those ideas, with experts; is that right?
Mr James Benford: So we didn’t have the Council of Economic Advisers in operation. We did set up seminars ourselves, and we sometimes used a group which emerged during this period, called the Economics Observatory, to set up forums on our – on our behalf. But one thing that had existed at other times is Council of Economic Advisers was not there.
Counsel Inquiry: Can you briefly provide a brief overview of what the Council of Economic Advisers is.
Mr James Benford: Yes. So, I mean, it – the form of that council has changed at different points. So it’s not been fixed. I think it was first established by Gordon Brown. And generally the model was that there’s someone who chairs the council, often the special political adviser in the Chancellor’s office with the most senior position, the Chief of Staff, and then they brought together both academics and economists operating in the market to discuss issues of the day.
I should say it’s quite a tricky set-up to make work, because you can’t give these people access to privileged information and you can’t give them a privileged position. That wouldn’t be right. And so, generally, the matters for discussion have been quite general, rather than specific areas of policy. And they’ve been minuted with clear agendas and so on, so that everything is – is transparent.
Counsel Inquiry: I think there was some attempt to set up that structure during the pandemic?
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: I understand the Chancellor was in favour of that; is that correct?
Mr James Benford: So I remember loosely that we did put a piece of advice up, just to suggest how it could be set up, referencing what had been done in the past. And I think that was in early 2021, but it never happened. As for exactly why, I don’t know.
Counsel Inquiry: Do you think that’s sort of structure would be helpful in a future crisis?
Mr James Benford: Well – so on that, it’s important to remember that that kind of structure isn’t the only source of independent advice for the Chancellor or the Treasury. There’s the Bank of England and there’s the Office for Budgetary Responsibility, and they were often sought as other ways of getting independent advice from views inside the Treasury.
I don’t think the role of that group is just for crises, it’s more general than that and it does help bring, you know, a broader range of views outside the system, so a challenge to groupthink, if you like. So it does have that value.
But as I touched on before, you know, there is real value in bringing different perspectives together, not just from economists, but from scientists too, and I could see value from having a stronger voice from economists on a group like SAGE just to make sure that perspectives are brought together and trust is built across the two communities.
Ms Wilson: Thank you, Mr Benford. Those are all my questions, but I understand there are some from Core Participants.
Lady Hallett: There are, Ms Wilson. Thank you very much.
Mr Beattie, who sits just there.
Questions From Ms Beattie
Ms Beattie: Thank you, my Lady.
Mr Benford, I ask questions on behalf of national Disabled People’s Organisations. You explain in your statement that your core responsibilities in the pandemic included working collaboratively with colleagues across the government, the HMT, Whitehall and beyond, to support a shared analysis and assessment of key macroeconomic issues, and that included collaboration within HMT, and engagement with analytical colleagues across the government economic service, Director of Analysis networks, as well as the Bank of England and the OBR and with externals, and you mentioned UK thinktanks, commentators and academics and international bodies such as the OECD and IMF.
Did that include any collaboration with Civil Society groups?
Mr James Benford: So I wasn’t personally involved in such collaboration. Other areas of the Treasury might have been, and I should say the Treasury had a general role to monitor the impact of policies on different groups, and that role was actually located in a different part of the Treasury. So it may be that that part of the Treasury had more of those links. But I didn’t have them, personally.
It was quite relevant to a number of pieces of economic work to know about the impact on different groups, and we did do some formal analysis at different points in time, for example working through whether schemes like the furlough scheme benefited different groups differently.
On disability, there was no evidence of any difference from the study that I was aware of.
Ms Beattie: I think you explain in your statement that that kind of macroeconomic work covered things like the labour market –
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Ms Beattie: – so for example, furlough?
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Ms Beattie: Or even broader analysis like the cost of living?
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Ms Beattie: And so would it be right, you’ve used the term “loadbearing” in answer to an earlier question.
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Ms Beattie: Would some of that analysis have been more loadbearing if it had brought in those other potential sources of information and data from Civil Society organisations, be they representative organisations of disabled people or otherwise?
Mr James Benford: I mean, in general, more sources of information, more views, the better. So yes. I wasn’t directly involved in that analysis; I was a consumer of it. So I don’t know about those, how the links worked with that area and those groups, but I can see value in those links existing, definitely.
Ms Beattie: Thank you, my Lady.
Lady Hallett: Thank you very much, Ms Beattie.
Ms Hannett, who is just behind.
Questions From Ms Hannett KC
Ms Hannett: Thank you, my Lady.
Mr Benford, I appear on behalf of the Long Covid Groups.
Mr James Benford: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: Can I ask you first, did the Economics Group carry out any assessment or analysis of the number of people who were economically inactive or whose ability to work was restricted by Long Covid?
Mr James Benford: So this was an important area, and one general question during the pandemic was what was the long-term impact, and what’s the long-term, what’s called a scarring impact on the economy, including through the labour market? And there was that area we touched on before in terms of a rise in inactivity. And I have looked back at some of my notes on this, and I remember that rise in inactivity being driven – in terms of that rise for health reasons, but by two different cohorts. One was mental health issues in the young, which tended to grow over time, and there was an older cohort who had a broader range, often physical issues.
Within that, we did do some work, or we were – we drew on analysis of the impact of low Covid (sic) specifically. My – when I went back to look at it, one particularly important study was an ONS survey in July 2022 which found around 27,000 people might be inactive due to Long Covid, and to put that in perspective, the rise in inactivity at that point was measured to be – (overspeaking) –
Ms Hannett KC: Sorry, Mr Benford, I don’t mean to cut across you but I’ve got very limited time. Can I just ask whether the Economics Group, I just want to confine your answer to my question, if you may.
Mr James Benford: Sure.
Ms Hannett KC: Did your group do any analysis on the effect of Long Covid?
Mr James Benford: We would have synthesised the available evidence.
Ms Hannett KC: Into?
Mr James Benford: To develop a view of the longer-term impacts of Covid, and the pandemic more broadly, on scarring, and the increase in inactivity in the labour market. And that survey suggested to us in 2022, July 2022, that the impacts were quite small. That was the last piece of work that I managed to find that was done specific to Long Covid during the period I was there at the Treasury.
Ms Hannett KC: Can I ask, is that understanding formulated in any formal document that can be provided to the Inquiry – with, my Lady’s leave, of course?
Mr James Benford: It’s possible. So that ONS survey is in the public domain.
Ms Hannett KC: I understand that. I’m asking about your analysis, your group’s analysis of that, whether that –
Mr James Benford: We can go and look. We can go and look. I mean, it would be –
Ms Hannett KC: Well, with my Lady’s leave –
Mr James Benford: I am not there anymore –
Ms Hannett KC: – I would be very grateful.
Mr James Benford: – but I’m sure we can go and look.
Ms Hannett KC: And my second question, Mr Benford, thank you, is are you able to make any recommendations as to how data can be gathered on the number of individuals who can’t work or whose productivity is curtailed due to suffering from the long-term sequelae of a novel virus in a future pandemic?
Mr James Benford: Right. Yes. It would be good to get on to some other recommendations, if there’s time.
So, one really important area is the linking of different data sets. And as we were trying to work out what to – what was driving that rise of inactivity that we talked about, we identified basically three areas of data – data in the health system, the benefits system, and the payroll system – that, if you like, could – could provide a lot of information on the impact of different health conditions.
And we did have, just as I was leaving the Treasury, discussion with people like Sir Chris Whitty and Sir Ian Diamond to set something up in that space. And I was very pleased to find, when I joined the ONS, that work on that data linkage had actually come to fruition and a number of important papers had been published from it. And, yeah, that area is a really important area as a basis for policy making.
It’s not clear that it necessarily needs to be done within the ONS, but it’s important that those linked datasets are made available. And there were costs in doing so you needed to prioritise, but it’s an important area.
Ms Hannett: Thank you. Thank you, Mr Benford.
Thank you, my Lady.
Lady Hallett: Thank you, Ms Hannett.
I think that completes the questions we have for you. Thank you very much for your help, Mr Benford. I hope you enjoy the new job.
You want to say something?
The Witness: If that’s okay? Because I was hoping to have the same chance that Rob did to just make an observation.
Lady Hallett: I’m sorry if we deprived you.
The Witness: So, I mean, I thought his group was excellent, and it’s a model that should be codified. I mean, just to build on what he said, there’s a particularly important group of individuals between the Chief Medical Officer, the Chief Scientific Adviser, the Chief Economic Analyst and the National Statistician, which I think could sit over a group like that and be a really good basis for building trust and collaboration.
On the sharing of Treasury information, looking back, I do think it would be possible to go further than happened. And, as I mentioned, there’s very detailed sharing that goes between the Treasury and the OBR in preparation for a budget, and there’s very good reasons that that can’t be shared at the time, but one thing that could be considered is whether something could be made available afterwards. I think if people saw that, then some of the suspicions about the Treasury would be – would be reduced.
And I also agree with Rob about the benefits of codifying, information sharing and how that should work, although of course that would need ministerial agreement.
Lady Hallett: Thank you very much indeed. And to the poor soul that you delegated the task of finding that analysis, if they’d like to wait until we see what the Inquiry says we need, then they needn’t go all of and do it just yet.
Thank you very much indeed for all the help.
The Witness: Thank you.
Lady Hallett: Very well, I shall return – I think the next witness is not available yet, and so I shall return at 1.30.
(12.29 pm)
(The Short Adjournment)
(1.29 pm)
Mr Wright: The next witness is Mr York-Smith.
Mr Dan York-Smith
MR DAN YORK-SMITH (affirmed).
Questions From Richard Wright KC, Lead Counsel to the Inquiry for Module 9
Lady Hallett: Sorry about the timing of this evidence session, Mr York-Smith. Not that you have had got anything else on this week!
The Witness: It’s a very quiet week.
Mr Wright: Thank you.
Mr York-Smith, you have provided a witness statement to this module of the Inquiry, and the reference for that is INQ000588227. That’s your personal statement and I think you’re also a signatory to a corporate statement, as well.
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: But we’re focusing on the personal statement principally today. And you’ve given evidence to the Inquiry previously, so you’re familiar with the process.
Just a little bit of background, if I may. You joined the Treasury a long time ago, from HMRC; is that right?
Mr Dan York-Smith: That’s right-ish, yes. HMRC didn’t exist at the time. Its predecessor department, yes.
Ms Hannett KC: Thank you. And so you’d been at the Treasury during the financial crisis in 2008?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: And you were still at the Treasury at the time of the Covid pandemic?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: At the start of the pandemic is it right that you were the Director of the Strategy, Planning and Budget Group?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, that’s correct.
Ms Hannett KC: And for how long had you been fulfilling that role; can you remember?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Slightly under two years. So I started in April 2018.
Ms Hannett KC: And we understand that during the pandemic you also assumed the role of director of the Covid-19 response team within the Treasury; is that right?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So the Covid-19 response team was a team within the Strategy, Planning and Budget Group, but, as the director of that group, I was responsible for that team as well as the other teams in the group.
Ms Hannett KC: Yes. So, as I say, you assumed responsibility for it, effectively?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: Yes. And to have a little bit of context, we know that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had himself been in post only since 14 February, and there was a budget scheduled for March of that year?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, that’s right.
Ms Hannett KC: Right. And in normal times, the Strategy, Planning and Budget Group – I am just going to ask if we can put up INQ000588226, page 9 of it, paragraph 26.
There we go.
And this describes the group at sitting at the heart of the Treasury and leading on the Department’s overall strategy, resourcing and prioritisation. It’s the Treasury’s central coordination function. Sets strategic direction or assists in doing that. Brings together the department’s objectives into a coherent strategy, and then oversees the budget and other fiscal events.
Is that a fair summary of the role at the time of that group?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, that’s fair. Yeah.
Ms Hannett KC: And so, before the pandemic, you were focusing, presumably, on preparing the budget that was a scheduled event?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, yeah. And it would have been the first budget for over a year, because in 2019, there was no budget. So it was a significant budget.
Ms Hannett KC: Yeah, okay. And you were director of that group, and then became the director of the Covid Response Team, and you use the term in your statement that that team evolved naturally from the team that was coordinating the budget; is that right?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: I just want to understand what you mean by that, that it just evolved naturally rather than being something that was stood up. I mean, it wouldn’t be stood up under the name of “Covid Response Team”, but how did it come about?
Mr Dan York-Smith: The budget director role, which – and the budget was the biggest thing that I was responsible for – seeks to bring together the whole of the Treasury, where you have lots of different teams working on different tax policies, spending policies, fiscal policies, to allow the Chancellor to make lots and lots of decisions, for those decisions to be presented consistently and effectively, to think about the implementation, the legislation which flows from it, and to give him a picture across the whole of the Treasury’s policy for those events.
When Rishi Sunak became Chancellor, shortly after he became Chancellor, he requested for the budget policies to respond to the emerging coronavirus.
Given that those policies cut across public spending, across welfare and across support for businesses, and that didn’t have a natural home in any one part of the Treasury, because all of those functions are separate, I took responsibility for trying to bring together those policies, and I used – part of the Strategy, Planning and Budget Group is a flexible pool of staff who can be deployed to emerging policy issues. It’s a thing which was a result of the review of the response to the financial crisis, building this core central resource that could be deployed to new and emerging areas quickly. And so I used part of that team, which I had oversight of, to coordinate the policy announcements which were ultimately made in the budget on 11 March, I think it was, which included support for public services, some welfare changes, and some – and some tax changes.
And the reason I say it evolved naturally was what – what the Covid Response Team was seeking to do was to fulfil a similar role of being a central contact point within the department to try to bring together what was a multifaceted economic response to the pandemic which engaged every bit of the Treasury, ultimately. Every single team was in some way involved in the economic response.
So it was – the team had been coordinating for the budget. Very quickly after that budget, we moved into a world of non-pharmaceutical interventions, lockdowns, and so on. And given that it wasn’t purely a health issue, it wasn’t a spending issue, it wasn’t a tax issue, it was all of those issues, it was agreed that I would just build up a team to respond to this, and to continue to lead it for a period.
Ms Hannett KC: So it made sense, did it, to take members of a team that were already working in that central overview role rather than trying to stand something up from outside? That made sense?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, although I would say that the people who formed the core of the team were not working on the budget, they were working for me and I was working on the budget. So the group had a culture and experience of doing that, but they were not less – I didn’t move people who had been working on the budget onto this, I actually drew on other bits of the department, this flexible team. I recruited two deputy directors to build the team and head the team.
Very shortly after that, I had put out an expression of interest process to set up the team on the day of the budget, in order to move very quickly, because it was very clear at that point that the nature of the health crisis was changing very rapidly. Yeah.
Ms Hannett KC: So, unpacking a little bit of that, the request to put something together came from the Chancellor, and the decision to deliver that by setting up this team came from you?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, although me in consultation with my manager, who was the Director General for Tax and Welfare and the Permanent Secretary at the time, Tom Scholar. So I suggested that it was the right thing to do, and they agreed, and we built – and actually, right at the very beginning, because I was so engaged in the budget, I asked Charles Roxburgh, who I know has provided a witness statement to this, to this module, and I think talks about it, I asked him to do some of the early convening, because I was seeking to deliver the budget, and he had the authority to do that convening.
Ms Hannett KC: Okay. And so although this team, with that name, was new, should we understand that this was the sort of team that it was envisaged could be stood up in a time of emergency, taking that learning from the previous financial crisis?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So I think it drew on some of the things which had been recommended as part of the response to the financial crisis. I think each economic crisis is different, and so the types of things that the Treasury had to do in response to the pandemic were quite different and engaged more teams in the department than in the financial crisis, where there was a very strong focus on financial stability and the bits of the Treasury that were responsible for that, and fiscal policy. But I would say much less in terms of – say, for example, when I try and think about how of the pandemic changed of the work of the Treasury and the extent to which we moved people around, if you were working on business tax when the pandemic happened, you were just doing business tax with respect to the pandemic. There was no other policy development happening, whereas I think in the financial crisis that was not true of as many parts of the department.
So the idea of having this central coordination team is not a thing that I think was a lesson from the pandemic. The idea of having the flexible resource which I used to create that team was a thing which was part of the response to the financial crisis.
Ms Hannett KC: You mentioned there financial stability, and the Treasury had a Financial Stability Directorate; is that right?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: And that directorate, was that engaged in pandemic preparedness generally?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So I believe they were. They do a lot of crisis management, and they are very well exercised, and they have a list of reservists for financial stability matters which was one of the recommendations after the financial crisis. It’s not – (overspeaking) –
Ms Hannett KC: Can I – can I just –
Mr Dan York-Smith: Sorry.
Ms Hannett KC: No, I just want to jump in and pick up on that as you mention it, rather than try and come back to it later. This idea of reservists, as you say. Reservists are people, as we understand it, individuals who have participated in dress rehearsals for future financial crises, is that right, and are ready to step in to offer that stability?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I think it’s probably – this was not my area of responsibility so I will say what I understand to be the case, but I think it’s not just – not that they have necessarily been involved in exercises but they have experience of working on financial stability, and in the event of a financial stability crisis they could therefore be drawn upon because there is a significant amount of expertise needed to properly think about the financial stability and the appropriate interventions.
So I’m not sure that it’s totally that they have all been exercised. It’s just they have in the past worked in that area so if there’s a need to significantly expand they could be re-called.
Ms Hannett KC: Were you a reservist, as it’s termed?
Mr Dan York-Smith: No.
Ms Hannett KC: No?
Mr Dan York-Smith: No, my background has been tax and welfare policy, primarily.
Ms Hannett KC: Looking at that then, do you know why the Financial Stability Directorate, which is – exists to ensure financial stability in a time of crisis, was not the body that was leading on the Covid response to the Treasury?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So they were involved because there were concerns about financial stability, but what they led on was specifically about the stability of the banking system and the financial system. That was a part of the impact of the pandemic, but that was quite a small part of the impact of the pandemic compared to the impact on employment, on the cost of public services, the public health response so – and the economic cost of it. So I don’t think it would actually, it would be – they would be experienced with part of the response but not the rest of the response.
Ms Hannett KC: Okay. So we should understand then, that financial stability or the Financial Stability Directorate, is a very specific thing that’s focusing on the sort of existential threat to the financial system –
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: – in a time of financial crisis –
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: – rather than thinking about it as having a wider economic remit in the time of any emergency?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, that’s correct.
Ms Hannett KC: Right. Understood. So that’s why it wouldn’t be a natural fit for them to take over because they had a much narrower focus?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: Okay.
Now, we know that in 2021, the Treasury undertook what was termed a Corporate Memory Project, essentially to record events from the memory of people who were there on the ground in the Treasury, and to try and identify immediate lessons that could be learnt, and we understand that was led by a deputy director, and authored by a researcher (redacted) at Number 10; is that right?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, that’s correct.
Ms Hannett KC: And a number of officials were interviewed for that project, and that included yourself; is that right?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: And one of the things that you said in your interview, and I’ll ask for it to be put up – it’s INQ000652988, page 1, there we are – is that:
“There wasn’t a natural home for these policies [these were policies to respond to Covid in the budget], so Dan asked someone for the SPB to coordinate advice.”
What did you mean by that phrase, “there wasn’t a natural home” for those sorts of policies within the pre-existing structures?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So, it’s partly what I’ve already mentioned: that the Chancellor – the budget announcements ultimately involved an increase in public spending to support – sort of pre-emptive increase in public spending for the NHS. It involved changes to Statutory Sick Pay. It involved changes to business rates, grants for businesses, additional flexibilities on the time that businesses had to pay their tax.
Those sit across probably half a dozen different policy teams in different parts of the Treasury, and what the Chancellor wanted was a single piece of advice on all of the things that he could do, therefore the – that was why I judged the appropriate place, given that it was also part of the budget, that the – one of the teams in my group should synthesise and bring that all together and say, “Here are all of your options from all the different teams in the Treasury”, rather than each individual team seeking to write their own advice and not necessarily being able to recognise whether there were gaps.
So the Chancellor had set out the types of things that he was concerned about, and someone needed to say, “Okay, if these are the types of things, what policy does this team have which might be appropriate? Okay thank you. And how does that fit with this team’s advice? And are they sufficient in scale? Are there things that we should be thinking about that we’re not?”
And I think, in – in – later – actually, the next bullet point in this, one of my concerns was there was insufficient ambition of some of these, given what the Chancellor was asking for. So I was asking other senior people in the department to push their teams to think about additional things that could be done and so on.
Ms Hannett KC: Okay. Well, I’ll come on to the next bullet, but just to continue on that answer you’ve just given, did you therefore think that there was a need to have a holistic response, in other words, bring together advice in one place for the Chancellor, rather than looking at teams in silos who could provide their own advice that might not necessarily be joined-up advice?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes. Yeah. Exactly. And there wasn’t, because each individual director would know about their area and, in a sense, this was a microcosm of the budget process, where Chancellors seek to include a mix of different policies with different objectives and how they all fit together. And also because they would then subsequently be announced in the budget and my team led on the production of all the documents and all the rest of it.
Ms Hannett KC: And would you really say that was stepping outside ordinary Treasury operating procedure and acting with some agility to set up that sort of cross-cutting body?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I think it was – I think it was agile in the circumstances, but was also very much in keeping with the type of thing that the teams that worked for me did, because any budget involves a mix of policies on tax, spending, welfare, and someone needs to say, “How do these all fit together? And what does the economic advice say? What does the public finances advice say? How do you implement it? How do you legislate for it?”
So that was – it was a natural – I think it’s – there wasn’t a natural home for that activity except for where the natural home for it was for budgets, which was in – in the group that I led.
Ms Hannett KC: Okay. Because in a budget the Chancellor needs to receive, again, that sort of joined-up advice –
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: – rather than advice from this section and that section and that section?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: Right. Understood.
So, looking on at the bullet points, let’s pick up that next one:
“Dan noted that this advice was cautious, and that Clare …”
That’s Clare Lombardelli, presumably?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: “… rang him on a Thursday evening to say the advice had to be much bigger.”
So let’s just look at that. The “advice was cautious”. What, the advice to the Chancellor? What advice were you talking about there?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So the advice that was coming from individual teams to then be brought together was – I mean, as far as I can recall, it was about the scale of the response. And ultimately we ended up – I think the budget package was, sort of, just above 10 billion. It was double digit billion. Which very quickly, by the following week, had been eclipsed, multiple times. But at the time, in the context of a budget, that was a very big set of interventions.
And I think, because the progress of the health side of the disease at that point was not well understood, people were being cautious and worrying about the cost of things, the practicalities, and I think the view from Clare Lombardelli, who was the Chief Economic Adviser, was there was a need to be more decisive, and to offer – and to give the Chancellor options to do larger interventions, given how – you know, this was maybe a couple of weeks before the budget – given the news that was beginning to emerge about what was happening in China and possibly in Italy at that point. I can’t quite remember the chronology, but …
Ms Hannett KC: So this was really an acceptance that you were going to have to at least think bigger in case much larger measures were needed?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: And you were doing that at an early stage and pushing back to those teams and saying, “No, this is fine in ordinary times but we need to think bigger”?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: Right. And then we see underneath that:
“Dan tried to get other director to be responsible for elements of the policy; this didn’t quite work out.”
Can you just help us with that, in terms of what you were trying to achieve and what didn’t work out?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I think it was particularly around the – some of the health response and whether, given, up to this point and I think I detail some of this in my written evidence, up until mid-March, when I established the Covid Response Team, most of the engagement on the emerging pandemic had been led from the health and economics groups, the health team and economics groups, and I think, because – my recollection is that this was a very big budget, we’d had a change of Chancellor a matter of weeks before, and it was quite a thing to get him comfortable with the decisions that he was making and support him to make those decisions and given there was already a bit of pre-existing expertise, I tested whether it was possible for more of this coordination to be done from the health side of – the health spending side of the Treasury.
Ultimately that didn’t work, including because, as I say, we ended up announcing quite a lot of welfare and tax policies which that director would have had limited knowledge of.
Ms Hannett KC: When this team was stood up under you, was it generally known in the Treasury that that structure was then in place?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: And was it generally understood that your team would be the conduit for advice to the Chancellor on the pandemic response from that point onwards?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, although I would say that the role of the team did evolve a little bit, given (a) the volume of advice that was going to the Chancellor, because the nature of the health restrictions changed very, very quickly after the budget, and most of the team’s work was actually on the interface with the Cabinet Office, which at the start of March had a Covid-19 secretariat. Later in the year that evolved into a taskforce, and it was as much about, at that point, the Cabinet Office were making lots and lots of different requests to lots of different parts of the Treasury and it was very difficult to understand where the central policy from the Cabinet Office about the health restrictions was going in order to inform the policymakers. And so the team’s role became very much about being able to help the team that was working on the furlough scheme, for example, understand the likely decision-making path of decision making and direction of decision making on the health restrictions so that the economic support policy could be tailored to it.
So I think it became – there was still an element of trying to synthesise, but it was as much about being a point through which requests from the Cabinet Office, or information about where they were going, would go.
A very early example, if I may, is when the decision was taken to close schools, there was – people who were identified as key workers would be able to continue to send their children to school. There was not a list of who was a key worker that existed at that point. And the Cabinet Office wanted Treasury views on the types of people that were necessary from an economic perspective to be designated key workers in order that, for example, we didn’t have an issue with payment systems, so people would still be able to pay for things because the people that maintained those would be able to attend work if they had children, because they would be able to – they would be able to take their children to school.
So that was a thing, where finding a way of asking lots of different Treasury teams: are there particular professions that are really important to the functioning of the economy even with these restrictions? If they tried to come in to, you know, any other team it would have been very difficult to get a single view. So the team that I had established led the process of going out to the whole of the Treasury and saying: okay, which are the professions that matter for the functioning of the economy?
Ms Hannett KC: So you were coordinating that response?
You already had a big job, as director of the Strategy, Planning and Budget Group, and you were planning a budget. And then you found yourself also running the Covid Response Team, and I’m not suggesting for a moment you weren’t up for the responsibility, but did that put significant strain on you at the time?
Mr Dan York-Smith: It was a very, very intense period and very – it was very difficult, partly just because of the volume of information and the pace of the change. I think there is something about the fact that from 15 or 16 March, just before people were advised to work from home if they could, the sort of softer NPIs, the whole work of the Treasury was on this. So in a sense, the budget was done, yes, obviously it’s difficult coming straight off the back of a budget which is an intense process, but there was – the only work that anyone in the Treasury was doing was in response to the pandemic.
So I sort of think my other responsibilities fell away for that initial period. Where it became more complicated was as we moved towards the summer and the Chancellor was making announcements, the Plan for Jobs in the summer, and then in the autumn there was the Winter Economy Plan, there was a spending review. That became more difficult to do both jobs, which was why I agreed that I would be replaced with my Covid responsibilities, because I was at that point properly doing two jobs.
Ms Hannett KC: So almost in the time of the most acute crisis, it didn’t overload you?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: Because everything else had stopped, there was nothing else to focus on. But then, when you started to move back into a more “business as usual” or trying to restart “business as usual” process with the other things of government and the Treasury to do, to deal with, then it became something that needed somebody else to step in and take over; is that a fair summary?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, that’s exactly right.
Ms Hannett KC: Right. Did you think that you had sufficient resource at the outset in your unit, that it was being taken seriously enough, that there was enough thought about how severe this shock could be?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I think we had the right resource at the time of the budget. We moved very quickly after the budget to bolster that.
I think, because it was such an unprecedented crisis and the way the central decision making about the thing which mattered most, which was the health restrictions, was changing so rapidly, with the benefit of hindsight, having more people would have been better but I don’t know that we would have understood what we needed to be doing, because what we needed to be doing was changing so quickly. We had people who came into the team and had to work on, for example, what the border policy would be and to give an economic view on that, or to gather the information about what the economic impacts of different policies would be. That is not a thing that we’ve previously had to do, so it was hard to anticipate that that would be a thing that someone would need to do, as it were.
So it was – it became a bit – it’s a bit circular.
I think there was so much work that obviously having more people across the whole of the Treasury would have been helpful, but it’s very difficult to set your, sort of, budgeting policy for this.
I, actually – my main reflection is that we did move – we had learnt lessons from previous economic shocks, like after the EU referendum, in the financial crisis, and we did move people a lot more quickly, and a lot more effectively, where previously when we’d tried to move people in response to shocks it hadn’t sort of really stuck. This stuck. We had structures which worked.
Ms Hannett KC: Okay, thank you.
I just want to pick up on something you said to the Corporate Memory Project.
So this is INQ000652988. It’s page 6. There we are.
You noted that the Covid team had been very effective, but then you said this:
“The thing to learn is moving quickly to identify someone who is responsible instead of allowing it to happen organically.”
So let’s deal with that first of all. You’ve told us really, that you assumed this responsibility, so it had happened organically for you, but you seem to be saying there that, you know, next time, there needs to be some more formality about this, or better planning? Can you just help us with what you were saying to the memory project.
Mr Dan York-Smith: I can’t entirely recall why I said this at the time. I think – I think you’re probably right about what I meant, that we should take a conscious decision about who the lead person is. I would say that I think that has happened since the pandemic. So, for example, when there was the Russian invasion of Ukraine with the impact on energy prices, we – we did move more quickly to identify a lead director to be responsible for how we responded to that, and the various things that were announced by the previous government to support households with the impact of energy prices. There was a much quicker – obviously that is a different type of economic shock, a bit narrower, but nevertheless, I think that lesson has been reflected on.
Ms Hannett KC: Okay. And then the rest of it:
“Dan also noted that they had underestimated the duration of the crisis, and this reflected in the need to refresh the resource and build resilience.”
Can you just help us with that part of the quote?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, so – and I think I covered this a little bit in my written evidence, but in February, and even into early March of 2020, the understanding of the scientific advice was that this crisis might be something where there was a three or four-month period over which lots of people were unwell and had to self-isolate for a two-week period, and that after that three-or four-month period there would be population immunity. So the duration of the crisis was not well understood at that point. There was an expectation that it would move quickly – it would move quite quickly, people would get sick, but not – the severity of the disease was definitely not well understood at the point of the March 2020 budget, when we began to set up these structures and teams.
Actually, as the pandemic progressed, people had had – particularly March and April was such an intense period for people designing the economic support schemes that we did need to rotate people, because people were working such long hours for such long periods that, from a resilience perspective, we needed to have a bit of rotation.
Ms Hannett KC: So that’s what you meant by refresh and resilience?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yeah.
Ms Hannett KC: It’s having the ability to bring people in, rest them –
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yeah.
Ms Hannett KC: – and keep the team fresh and able to work under the pace that’s required?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Exactly.
Ms Hannett KC: Okay.
I appreciate that this is a question that has an element of hindsight about it, but we know the team was set up on the weekend of 14 or 15 March. Looking back, would you have preferred that the team was in place earlier, that the work had started earlier than that weekend?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, I think it would have been helpful to have had something earlier. It did sort of exist in outline a little bit before that. So, when – I forget the exact date but I think it was late February when – the – the previous section of my Covid corporate memory interview you went to where I talked about coordinating that initial advice for the budget. That happened in late February. That did involve bringing in a deputy – there was a deputy director who had just returned from parental leave who I asked to do some of this. There were a couple of people borrowed from elsewhere in the department, someone from the Flexible Project Team that I had in my group.
A lot of those people were then the core of the team, which then formally came into existence immediately after the budget. So it had begun a little bit, but I think a lot of it was because of the development of how the Cabinet Office were approaching the policy making about social distancing restrictions, which did change very, very rapidly over the course of early March.
Ms Hannett KC: I mean, you also say in your statement, we don’t need to put it up, it’s paragraph 56 for reference, but you say there that it would have been beneficial to have had more resource allocated to preparations at the outset.
And again, there’s always an element of hindsight about this, but is really your reflection that, if there was any failure to properly resource or stand it up earlier, it was that there was a reliance on the proposition that this would be over quite quickly and there perhaps hadn’t been enough planning for the worst-case scenario but rather assuming it wouldn’t be as bad as all that?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yeah, I think that is, that is fair. The advice at the time was – did consider the reasonable worst-case scenario that had been produced by the scientists, but that reasonable worst-case scenario itself got significantly worse in early March, particularly immediately after the budget, where – the weekend that you referred to, where I’d sort of appointed the two deputy directors to lead this team. That was the weekend where there was a change in the view about how far along the curve we were, and that more action needed to be taken much more quickly.
Ms Hannett KC: Okay. Thank you.
Can I move on a little to the initial economic response, and I just want to ask you some questions about how it all emerged really.
We know that you were providing economic advice to the Chancellor in February, 14 February, 26 February. All of that was caveated with lots of uncertainty about estimates and about the worst-case scenario, as you’ve just said. The budget is then delivered on 11 March, I’m just setting this out for context for everybody, budget delivered on 11 March. I think by that point Italy had certainly had some lockdowns, so the situation in Europe was deteriorating.
And I’m just going to ask that INQ000652988 goes up. This is pages 1 and 2. This is back to the memory project. Right at the bottom of page 1. Your thinking at the time:
“Dan reflected that the day before the Budget he thought that this would last at least a few months and the Treasury perception (in part impacted by limited case mortality rate information), was that this would be a temporary shock where people have to isolate at home for two weeks.”
I mean, did that reflect your thinking that you were beginning to think yourself that there might be a disconnect between what might happen and what the Treasury was assuming would happen?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So it’s difficult, it’s difficult to properly recall exactly at what point I realised things were much worse than we had understood, other than that I do recall, on the Sunday, which I believe was 15 March, being invited to a meeting in Downing Street, which the Chancellor hadn’t been invited to, to try and –
Ms Hannett KC: Sorry, did you say “hadn’t”?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Hadn’t been invited to, no, which had a number of ministers and people from the Cabinet Office and from Downing Street, and that was, I think, the weekend where, as I’d previously said, the scientific advice about how – the seriousness of the virus, but also how far it had progressed in terms of the case rate, changed significantly.
And I think prior to that, particularly because how I understood the health advice had been – I think there are some other documents in the evidence proposal that you refer to from the 14th and later in February, those were very much setting out this sort of picture: that it would be a temporary shock. And I think even on the 15th, I realised it was more severe but the duration was still not apparent.
Ms Hannett KC: Yeah, okay. I think we can pick up that. Actually, you mention this to the Memory Project, if we just go down to the page 2. It’s the same INQ. I think that meeting at – there we are, Sunday, 15 March:
“… 2-hour meeting in the Cabinet Room involving the Health Secretary, the Chief Medical Officer, Chief Scientific Adviser … The Chancellor had not been invited to this, and Dan made a pitch that he should go as this would have a significant impact on the economy.”
So do you know why the Chancellor wasn’t invited to that?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I don’t, I’m afraid.
Ms Hannett KC: I mean, did it surprise you at the time that the Chancellor wasn’t at that sort of high-level meeting when the economy was obviously going to be affected to some extent?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, I was concerned, and as I, sort of, set out to this Corporate Memory Project, I thought someone from the Treasury needed to go, because the issues being considered were so significant in their – in terms of their economic impact.
Ms Hannett KC: But it had to be you asking to go, rather than somebody from the Cabinet Office saying, you know, “It would be a good idea to have the Treasury here”?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, yes.
Ms Hannett KC: If we just go down three bullet points, we see there “Dan regularly attended”. That bullet, if we could:
“Dan regularly attended and noted that the week commencing the 16th turned out to be a key week. In part as on Monday, Dan had been working late and saw the PM announcement on Twitter – on not going to work if you could avoid it and to avoid going to pubs/restaurants.”
And then underneath that:
“At 10.15 pm – Dan saw at 10.15 pm that No. 10 had briefed the newspapers that the Treasury would announce a support package, of which nothing existed at the time and this led to a frantic evening to pull together that package to support particularly affected sectors.”
So this was the Prime Minister announcing that people should avoid going to work, avoid going to pubs and restaurants. From your perspective as a Treasury man, I mean, presumably you thought that’s inevitably going to have a significant effect on the economy?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: And did you find out about it on Twitter? That’s the first you knew about it?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I don’t fully recall, but I think that actually this is not a very accurate account. My – as far as I recall, what I discovered was that the – the suggestion that the Chancellor would the following day be announcing a significant package of economic support, where I think this write-up probably overstates, I don’t think it’s correct that nothing existed, because people were doing thinking, but I think the fact that there was going to be an announcement the following day was not something that had been pre-agreed.
Ms Hannett KC: I mean, had the Treasury at 10.15 pm, on that date, had the Treasury got its support package ready to announce the next morning?
Mr Dan York-Smith: No.
Ms Hannett KC: Did it exist in any worked-up way?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So my best recollection is that we gathered the following morning with the policy teams who had been thinking about particularly loans, and that was ultimately one of the biggest parts of the support announced the following day, but also some of the teams who had previously worked on policies for the budget on business rates and business grants, which were, in effect, extended. So the budget that announced a holiday – or a complete holiday on business rates, but only for small and medium-sized properties, and on the 16th – or on the 17th, rather, it was extended to all retail, hospitality and leisure priorities in light of the instruction to avoid going to pubs and restaurants.
Ms Hannett KC: Accepting that things were moving quickly, to announce a policy in a package at a time when it doesn’t in fact exist in any worked-up way, I mean, did you think that was surprising?
Mr Dan York-Smith: With the benefit of hindsight, I actually don’t, because things were moving so incredibly quickly that it was necessary for the policy-making process to move as quickly .
I think it was – obviously, when I was giving this interview, I was reflecting on the fact that a better process would have been to agree that it was going to be announced before – that there would be a package before briefing that. But I think the fact that it happened at pace was not, with the benefit of hindsight, actually surprising, because the health restrictions were moving at such a pace.
Ms Hannett KC: And talking of moving at pace, and please don’t think that I’m being critical by any of my questions, I’m just tying to understand your position, but talking of moving at pace, your team and the Treasury moved at incredible pace then, after the 16th; would you agree?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, yeah. The policy work in that week, which culminated in the announcement of the Coronavirus – the furlough scheme – I can’t fully remember what the CJRS stands for. Job –
Ms Hannett KC: Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme –
Mr Dan York-Smith: That’s the one.
Ms Hannett KC: – is what we’ve been calling it.
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yeah.
Ms Hannett KC: I hope that’s right.
Mr Dan York-Smith: That is correct.
Ms Hannett KC: But it’s what we’ve been calling it. But anyway, that was announced on 20 March.
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: And the Covid Corporate Financing Facility on 17 March. So you had that announcement on the 15th, and then by the 20th the Job Retention Scheme is worked up and announced, and the financing facility on the 17th.
I mean, that sort of agility in developing policy, was that unusual in government full stop?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I think for the scale of intervention, yes. Government – in the pandemic, lots and lots of departments moved at incredible pace to develop policy. I think this is – this is probably the largest number, size – number and size of policies at this pace that I’ve experienced in my time at the Treasury. And I think it is – it’s a – I personally – I should point out that I personally was not responsible for any of the schemes. That was – that was done by others. I was, you know, peripherally involved in helping to – to see how they all fitted together, but it was incredibly – it was an incredible response, in the time.
Ms Hannett KC: And that presumably involved having to suspend ordinary government operating systems and structures and freed up innovative thinking?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, it was – there was a combination of things. I think there was – there was a difference in risk appetite, recognising the consequences of not acting would be so significant. So there was a tolerance of higher levels of potential fraud and error, although at every point we sought to mitigate that as far as we could. There was greater willingness to announce something and then to tweak it as necessary in response to a – situations that hadn’t been envisaged or how particularly the health restrictions were – were progressing.
But there was a willingness, given the circumstances and the alternative of not providing the support, to take a different risk appetite on a large number of elements of what would otherwise be good policymaking.
Ms Hannett KC: I just want to pick up on that, the alternative of not taking these steps.
I mean, what was the state of thinking in the Treasury? You’re doing these things at incredible speed, you’re taking risks and cutting across decisions that would normally take weeks or months to come to fruition; what was the sense of what might happen if you didn’t act with that speed and if you didn’t deliver this sort of support quickly?
Mr Dan York-Smith: It’s very, very significant worries about large-scale unemployment, the impacts that would have on people’s living standards, poverty, large-scale business failure, and very significant lasting economic damage.
The biggest priority, and particularly as evidenced in the CJRS, was about preserving economically valuable links between firms and their workers, and that – that – people losing their jobs and businesses failing because they were not allowed to open or not allowed to trade, effectively because the government had restricted their ability to do so, was the number 1 thing that we were all worried about.
Ms Hannett KC: And I just want to ask if this is also came into the thinking: that the government was restricting people’s ability to do these things and asking people to comply with those restrictions; was the need for the government to support business, support jobs, support incomes, linked to the need for people to comply with the restrictions the government was implementing?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, I think the notion of compliance with the restrictions became more important as the restrictions evolved, and as the pandemic progressed for longer, because some of the advice was about fatigue and people’s willingness to comply with restrictions that endured.
I think actually the notion of compliance was less of a worry at that point because I think there was large – there was evidence that people were isolating before they were required to do so. So there was a lot of, sort of, spontaneous behaviour anyway, because people were very worried about the virus and the pro – and the health implications.
So it was less about “people won’t comply unless we give this support”; more an assumption that people would probably comply, and that if they complied and we didn’t give the support, businesses would fail, people would not be able to – you know, would lose their jobs, would not be able to afford to live, and so on.
Ms Hannett KC: And does that in part explain why you weren’t waiting for the Prime Minister to announce further social restrictions to start your planning because you were assuming anyway that people were naturally starting to modify their behaviour, that that would have an effect on the economy in any event?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, although my recollection is that even by the 20th – by the 16th, when there was the “work from home if you can”, “don’t go to pubs and restaurants”, I think at that point we had a good understanding of what the next level of restrictions would be, and how quickly they might come. So it was also needing to have that support in place ahead of the announcement of the lockdown in order to give people confidence, and I definitely recall people who were leading on the design of the CJRS saying that the response from businesses to the announcement on the 20th that the scheme would exist was: many, many people calling them, you know, business owners in tears because they were really worried that they would otherwise have had to lay off their staff and they now no longer had to because the government were stepping in in such a significant way to pay the wages of, ultimately, millions of workers.
Ms Hannett KC: I just want to pick up on something about how this was all possible from a delivery perspective. And if this is outside your core competence, then do say, but we’ve heard evidence about this unique relationship, really, between the Treasury and Revenue & Customs?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Hannett KC: And you had been in the forerunner to Revenue & Customs, and we’ve heard it explained that that’s in part because HMRC doesn’t have a minister, and the two work closely together, but how important was it that you had the ability to formulate policy and have those who were responsible for delivery working alongside you?
Mr Dan York-Smith: It was completely essential, and that policy partnership, and I’ve worked in it on both sides of the divide, is, I think was really critical to understanding – it’s not just how can you deliver what you want, but what can you deliver that might have the outcomes you hope? So it was very much an iterative process and I think it’s one which it pre-dated the pandemic. Obviously it was tested and used to a degree that is very unusual by the pandemic, but having HMRC who are experts in delivery and who deliver tax policy and other policies for the government at pace regularly, having them say, “This is how we could do what you want to do”, which might not have been the way that we as policy advisers would necessarily have thought was the best way of doing it, but they would say, “This is the information we have, these are the systems we have, this is how quickly we can build it, this is how quickly we can get it up and running”, and that drove a lot of our decision making and it did lead in some places where HMRC, for example, didn’t have information, it made it harder to do things, but I think that partnership and the fact that actually it was one of the benefits of everyone working remotely, was it was much easier, because the culture had become that every meeting was virtual. It’s much easier to both have a larger meeting, but also to have, you know, what otherwise were geographically disparate members of HMRC on calls with the Chancellor.
I interacted with them particularly because later in 2020, when the health restrictions were becoming more regional in nature, HMRC needing to understand how do we tell whether a business is allowed to be open or is forced to be closed in order that we know what economic support they’re entitled to and whether we need to – whether we need to do compliance work, because someone who’d said that they’d been forced to be closed actually aren’t forced to be closed in this particular area.
So that interaction of where the health restrictions were going was also part of the interaction between the Treasury and HMRC.
Ms Hannett KC: Now, I appreciate you’ve moved on but you may still have a passing interest in the machinery of government. So that policy partnership, you’ve spoken about all the positives about it. Could that be developed elsewhere in government, in terms of a future emergency, to bring together that delivery and policy?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So I think it works in other departments, as well, and definitely the relationship with DWP was very strong. I think part of the differences, this point about ministerial oversight, that the minister with responsibility for HMRC is a Treasury minister, the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury currently is the minister responsible for HMRC, and that having a single political leadership facilitates some of that.
There is also a kind of systems thing and the fact that when working physically together, HMRC’s office is next to the Treasury’s, or one of their London offices, but I do think it could definitely be developed further although I would say that with DWP, who were the other big delivery department for a lot of the economic support schemes, it was very, very effective and it was very, very effective again in 2022 when responding to the cost of living, the energy crisis.
So I think it is – it can work elsewhere, but you have to have ministers that are willing to work together in that way, where there are not different ministers for – between HMRC and the Treasury. It’s the same set.
Lady Hallett: And in a future crisis, we don’t necessarily know which departments are going to be most involved?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes. Yeah, it depends entirely on the nature of the crisis.
Mr Wright: Right, thank you. I want to move on to a slightly – well, a different topic, policy coordination between NPIs and the economic response.
And I’m just going to illustrate that with some questions about the economic response to a second wave, and I’m going to ask that the Corporate Memory Project is put up again.
So INQ000652988. This time, page 4, and the penultimate bullet at the bottom of page 4, please, if we could have that highlighted:
“Dan noted final act was November lockdown – towards the end it was a bit more about explaining the economic support available as the Chancellor had set out on a path in the summer of withdrawing the economic support on the basis that the seasonal resurgence would be smaller, and we’d manage with the Covid secure guidelines and 2 metre rule.”
And the next bullet, please:
“Dan noted the Treasury was playing catch-up from September onwards with the reality of the pandemic, and therefore having to extend the support at short notice.”
Now, again, I’ll give you an opportunity, first of all, do you accept that that captures your reflections at the time?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I wouldn’t say it entirely does. I – I definitely, and I think in my additional written statement for this module, covered this a little bit. I think the period of September and October in particular there was this desire that I talked about to take a more regional approach, a more geographically restricted approach to restrictions with what became the tiering and so on, and that the Treasury were seeking to make the economic support schemes that existed for a world where the restrictions were national, work in that situation. And there was lots of discussion about, you know, substantial meal, and various things and whether that meant you could be open or closed.
Partly, I think, because one of the Treasury’s worries at the time, the Chancellor’s worries – and I should say there’s a bit of using the terms interchangeably, and – and I think, in a way which doesn’t, I think, happen so much with other government departments – obviously all of these decisions were the Chancellor’s, the Treasury would advise and provide analysis, but – but I think, you know, the – the two terms end up being a bit more interchangeable than I think they should be.
But one of the worries from the very first period was that the economic impact had been bigger of the first lockdown than anticipated, because people who could not work from home and sectors where working from home was impossible, like, for example, construction, had shut more than was required by the rules. And therefore in the – in the autumn we wanted to make sure that the economic support aligned with what the health restrictions were. So if the health restrictions said you should be closed, you got more support than if the health restrictions said that you didn’t have to be closed, and to try and have a more nuanced approach.
I think that was reflected both in the health approach, where we had very – you know, there were lockdowns in areas of the North – North West of England, very small geographical areas in the North West of England in September, and I think what September and October showed was that because of the developments in the virus, that kind of regional approach just didn’t work.
And I think that is – that is my reflection on this period: that the Treasury was following that more regionally-specific set of restrictions, but the reality was the virus was not behaving in a way which worked with those – those restrictions, and the idea that Covid-secure guidelines – and there was lots of work in the summer on the so-called smarter NPIs, and issues like, you know, masks, and so on, those were not actually having the impact that anyone believed they were having, and the strategy changed very substantially at the end of October.
And I think having spent months designing a set of interventions to work for regional tiering, open and closed sectors, that all had to be reversed at the end of October. And I do think that that led to worse economic outcomes for businesses taking decisions on the basis that there would be no CJRS and we’d move to the Job Support Scheme. Because the health restrictions changed to be national, that plan had to change.
Ms Hannett KC: So, would you say then that this wasn’t the Treasury being out of step with the health restrictions; rather, it was the Treasury trying to do the best for the economy it could, as against the health restrictions that were in place at the time?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yeah.
Ms Hannett KC: So, trying to restore as many parts of the economy as it could, but then when things changed because of the viruses, the Treasury strategy had to change in step with it to – for example, when we went into the second lockdown?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, I think that’s exactly right, that at all times the economic support schemes were trying to work for a given set of NPIs. Given the pace at which the NPIs began to change again, in the autumn, that just – that just didn’t work.
Ms Hannett KC: I just want to pick up one other topic briefly and then I’m going to give you an opportunity just to share any reflections you have, having led that team, as to any improvements that could still be made or any observations you have about the future.
It’s just this question about the devolved administrations. We’re going to hear from Sir Charles Roxburgh, who accepts in his witness statement that in hindsight, he could have done more with the devolved administrations. From your perspective, do you think there was sufficient consultation, and that you could have done any more with the devolved administrations?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So I had fairly limited interactions with them. There was someone in the Scottish Government that I spoke to. I think that partly reflected the nature of my role, which was very much about coordinating within the Treasury, and with the Cabinet Office. And so it wouldn’t have been typical in my budget role for me to be leading on that. I think there was a lot of engagement, particularly on the public spending side of the Treasury, where that was one of the main routes via which some elements of economic support were sort of transmitted where there was additional funding for the devolved governments.
I think in general on everything, more consultation is better, but I think the context was such that consultation comes with a cost, in terms of the time that it takes, and the people required to do it properly. And particularly in the early part of the pandemic, we had to move very, very quickly, and so had we done additional consultation, that might have delayed the ability to implement things. I think there was lots and lots of engagement on some of the schemes, although again, I would say that’s not something that I would have led on; it would have been for the people responsible for the schemes, but there was definitely a trade-off between consultation, and more is always better, but there is a trade-off with pace.
Ms Hannett KC: Now, we’ve obviously dealt with a number of aspects of decision making and how teams are resourced, and so on and so forth, and you’ve spoken about some learning that’s already been done, but do you have any other reflections, looking back, about developments for the future that could or should be considered?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I think some we’ve already talked about. I definitely I think identifying very quickly someone to be responsible, where it’s something which is novel and doesn’t necessarily sit within a particular area of a particular department. I think one of the things that developed most over the course of the pandemic was actually the central decision-making architecture, and I think particularly from the point, actually, at which I stopped being involved, from November onwards, I really think that the Covid taskforce in the Cabinet Office had a much more orderly way of communicating about how decisions would be made, synthesising the information from different parts of government about the implications and so on. I think unfortunately, it is a consequence of just how quickly things moved in the spring that that didn’t happen in the best possible way.
And I think there is a learning about this, this taskforce approach in the Cabinet Office, where it is something that requires lots of different bits of government to input, which would be, I think, very beneficial for a future crisis.
Mr Wright: Thank you very much, those are my questions. I think there are some Core Participant questions.
Lady Hallett: There are.
Thank you very much, Mr Wright.
Ms Beattie, who is just there.
Questions From Ms Beattie
Ms Beattie: Thank you.
Mr York-Smith, I ask questions on behalf of national Disabled People’s Organisations, I’m going to ask you a few questions about the Covid Response Board which I think you chaired and which you tell us coordinated equalities impact work. My question is: what specific input about equalities impact, including on disabled people, did the board contribute to submissions to ministers on proposed economic interventions that Treasury was either sort of putting forward or advising on?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So the board itself would not have produced the equalities impact, that would have been for each individual scheme, and I’m certainly aware that what the board did consider, and input to the Chancellor, was about what we understood of the equalities impacts of the health restrictions, and therefore, the impact on particular sectors. So one example, which is not specifically about people with disabilities, but was about the impact of hospitality and leisure and the types of people that worked in those sectors.
I do know that, for example – the one that I’m aware of particularly is for the furlough scheme, that there was quite an extensive impact assessment given to the Chancellor about the impact on different protected groups. But I was not responsible for any of the schemes, so I’m not well placed to answer about what specific consideration was given to equalities impact on people with disabilities from any of the schemes.
Ms Beattie: Right, so it could have been in something that went up about a particular scheme, but you’re saying there wasn’t something more general about protected characteristics impact that was going to ministers from the board?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So for each scheme, there definitely would have been. The thing that the board considered was the equalities impact and the impact on different protected groups of all of the health restrictions. I don’t think it is something which is in my evidence proposal for this, but certainly is – I’m aware that it has been considered in a previous module.
Ms Beattie: So yes, so again, so that’s the NPIs –
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Beattie: – but not economic interventions.
Mr Dan York-Smith: Not in totality. It would have been done scheme by scheme, because the schemes all worked differently and their impacts would all have been different.
Ms Beattie: And the Chancellor, in his statement, says he didn’t receive readouts from the board or attend its meetings. So in the absence of that attendance, I understand the Chancellor is very busy, but that attendance or receiving readouts, did the Chancellor and other Treasury ministers receive details of the board and sub-board’s analysis directly in any written form?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, because the board itself was not – it was not a decision-making forum; it was a forum by which people shared information about the policy work they were doing, the analysis they were doing. All of that policy work and analysis would ultimately have ended up in a submission to the Chancellor. As I say, I’m definitely aware the Chancellor received something about NPIs. I can’t say whether he – what he received for each individual scheme, because both I don’t recall but I wouldn’t have been responsible for any of those, I wasn’t responsible for any of those schemes.
Ms Beattie: Right, so we’d have to check those individual documents?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes.
Ms Beattie: You, as I’ve said earlier, in relation to Covid Response Board, which you chaired and which coordinated that equalities impact work, what external input did the board seek and receive, including from external equalities bodies and representative organisations such as Disabled People’s Organisations, which are majority led, staffed and governed by disabled people as distinct from charities, to inform its strategy and analysis?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So – and I probably should have said this in answer to one of your earlier questions, the Covid Response Board didn’t coordinate equalities analysis.
Ms Beattie: Oh, right I understood your statement said that it coordinates equalities – it coordinated equalities impact work. I think that’s at 110 of your statement, but is that not the case?
Mr Dan York-Smith: No, that is not the case. It would have – it would have been one of the things that it talked about, but it would not have coordinated it, because it was a meeting which brought together lots of subject-matter experts, one of which would have been the team that is responsible for producing equalities analysis, but that team sat in a different part of the Treasury to mine. So I’m afraid I can’t speak to what consultation they did.
The board itself was a purely internal structure about information sharing.
Ms Beattie: Right, so that’s at a team level. So were you aware of any structure above that team that coordinated equalities impact work within the Treasury?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Yes, there is a team called the Labour Markets Analysis and Distributional Impact Team (sic) which produces equalities analysis, and also trains other teams how to consider equalities impacts in their policy work.
Ms Beattie: And is that specific to labour market – (overspeaking) –
Mr Dan York-Smith: No, they do both labour markets and distributional and equalities impacts. The two happen to sit together, but it’s not just on the labour market, no.
Ms Beattie: And I think if we, looking at what the Covid Response Board covered, I think in June 2020, is it right that there was a reference to focus on equalities, is it enough, and what can we do to centralise equalities as a key policy driver; do you remember that being a matter that was discussed at the board and what happened in response?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So I do think that there was a discussion about the equalities impact of the NPIs, as I say. I don’t think that – I don’t think it was about the impact of the schemes, but I – I can’t really recall.
Ms Beattie: Was it not something important for the board to look at the equalities impact of those schemes, not only of the NPIs, in a more general way?
Mr Dan York-Smith: Given the nature of the board, I don’t think it was. It was something which the Chancellor would have been advised. It wasn’t necessarily something which the board itself would have discussed at length, because the Chancellor was receiving the advice directly.
I’m possibly not explaining very well how – how the board worked and what its particular role was, but it wasn’t a gateway to the Chancellor and it didn’t consider everything. It was, as I say, primarily about sharing information, so all the different teams working on the Covid response and the individual schemes had the same set of information about what was happening with the restrictions, in particular, the economy.
So it’s possible that it did, but I’m afraid I can’t recall exactly to what extent it did.
Ms Beattie: My next question is a bit more about those policy teams. You referred to the – in your statement, to the equalities policy team and the equality and living standards analysis team, which I understand to be two separate teams, and say that those provided advice and guidance to policy teams and created – oh, apologies, sorry, the corporate statement from HMT goes further and explains that those teams provided advice and guidance and created analytical tools such as the equalities explorer dashboard?
What equalities analysis did you receive from those teams?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So it would be the kind of thing that I’ve talked about in terms of – I’m afraid I’m going to focus on the non-pharmaceutical interventions, because that was the thing that I was more involved in. But they – the second of those teams, it’s not a team, it’s a part of that Labour Markets and Distributional Analysis Team, they have a bit of that team which does equalities and living standards analysis.
I’m sure that I saw in advice to the Chancellor the outputs of their analysis, but I’m afraid I can’t give specific examples other than I know that Rishi Sunak’s witness statement talks specifically about the equalities analysis that he received on the – the introduction of the furlough scheme, the CJRS.
Ms Beattie: So I suspect your answer will be the same: that you didn’t use the work of those teams directly in your role as chair of the Covid Response Board?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I will have seen it, but I think, yeah.
Ms Beattie: And just to be clear, in relation to the Equalities and Living Standards Analysis Team, which you mention, is it in fact the case that that wasn’t formed until 2021? I don’t think we know the date in 2021, so that wouldn’t have been a team that had any input or that you could have drawn on during your tenure as chair of the Covid Response Board?
Mr Dan York-Smith: So I think – I think … my best recollection is that the Treasury decided to increase the amount of resource that it had to conduct analysis – such analysis. But the – there were people doing that analysis before. This wider Labour Markets and Distributional Analysis team, which produces lots of impact analysis on the impacts on incomes in the household distribution and the equalities analysis, they have existed before, but there was a decision in 2021 to increase the amount of resource available in that team and also on the public services side of Treasury, which is where a lot of those impacts are felt.
It did exist before then because analysis was produced in 2020 about – the one that I’m certain about is about the furlough scheme.
Ms Beattie: And that dashboard in fact wasn’t launched until spring 2023, so even after her Ladyship’s terms of reference; is that right?
Mr Dan York-Smith: I’m afraid I don’t know, yeah.
Ms Beattie: Thank you, my Lady.
Lady Hallett: Thank you, Ms Beattie.
That completes the questions we have for you, Mr York-Smith. I know you’ve helped us before. Thank you very much indeed for all the help you’ve given to the Inquiry, and to your former colleagues, who I suspect had a hand in helping you with the witness and the like. So, thank you again, and I shall resist the temptation to ask what this week has been like.
Thank you. I shall take the break now. Oh, you’ve got the restriction order?
Mr Wright: Yes, please. Sorry, my fault. 13.45 or thereabouts, restriction order, please, for the transcript and the live feed, I mentioned the name of the author of the Corporate Memory Project.
Lady Hallett: Certainly. I shall return at 3 o’clock.
(2.44 pm)
(A short break)
(3.00 pm)
Lady Hallett: Ms Wilson.
Ms Wilson: My Lady, may I please call Dr Ben Warner.
Dr Ben Warner
DR BEN WARNER (affirmed).
Questions From Counsel to the Inquiry
Lady Hallett: Welcome back, Dr Warner.
The Witness: Thank you.
Ms Wilson: Dr Warner, thank you for attending and assisting the Inquiry again today. You’ve provided a second witness statement to this module of the Inquiry, with reference number INQ000657617, which is signed and dated 13 October 2025; is that correct?
Dr Ben Warner: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: I want to start by asking you, please, about data science capabilities across government. So the context of that is you were appointed to the Civil Service as a special adviser in December of ‘29; is that correct?
Dr Ben Warner: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: Sorry, 2019; is that correct?
You had a broad remit, effectively working to provide support in the field of data science across government?
Dr Ben Warner: Yes, although actually a lot of my work was on data infrastructure, how we collected data. So the whole processing from – you know, from the whole of that, the requirements to get to data science, not just data science.
Counsel Inquiry: So digital data?
Dr Ben Warner: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: Data science?
Dr Ben Warner: Exactly.
Counsel Inquiry: And why is all of that important in a fast-paced emergency like a pandemic?
Dr Ben Warner: I think that sort of stuff is important in the modern world.
Counsel Inquiry: We heard this morning from Mr Benford that having good capabilities in those areas helps with an agile but also an efficient response. Do you agree?
Dr Ben Warner: I think technology helps organisations be efficient, whether in a crisis or in normal times.
Counsel Inquiry: And is it also right that you worked to support individual departments to improve their capabilities in those fields?
Dr Ben Warner: Where I could with departments, I definitely did.
Counsel Inquiry: And in order to provide an assessment of a department’s capability you would require information from that department and to work closely with them; is that right?
Dr Ben Warner: I never carried out that type of assessment.
Counsel Inquiry: Okay. Can we look at two departments, please, relevant to the economic response.
The first one is the former Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, BEIS. What was your view as to their data science, data technology capabilities?
Dr Ben Warner: In Mike Keoghan I think they had a very good leader who cared very deeply about trying to improve how we thought about analysis and data science in government. And then in Luke Perera, who reported to him, there was a good leader of that data science team. I’d known them before I joint government and had been impressed by their efforts, and so when I joined government I’d often speak to them about how they had managed to be successful in government and the lessons learnt.
Counsel Inquiry: Yes, I think you mention in your statement that you looked to BEIS to learn – and the individuals who worked in there to learn the lessons of their successes. What were the lessons that you learnt from that?
Dr Ben Warner: I think it would be better to ask them. Given it’s been five years, I wouldn’t be able to tell you exactly what they would say.
Counsel Inquiry: One – a couple of features picked out from other evidence we’ve received included that it had several data scientists, it was very quick to install a multidisciplinary data science team? Are those sorts of features which you also observed?
Dr Ben Warner: Yes, I think those are the sort of things that they did.
Counsel Inquiry: And what about work in relation to real-time indicators, on the economic response to the – (overspeaking) –
Dr Ben Warner: I think I spoke to them briefly about that work, and I think they would send me their work and talk me about their work, yes, during the Covid pandemic.
Counsel Inquiry: Did you find departments, including BEIS, receptive to your support across government?
Dr Ben Warner: Across government I think lots of people were very, both receptive but also very helpful for me in pushing forward the digital and data agenda, there was lots of people across government who really sort of provided support, provided help, resources, to try and help a whole-of-government effort to try and improve.
Counsel Inquiry: Moving now to ask you about your observations on the Treasury on digital and data and technology, you were introduced to the Treasury via an official in Number 10, I think if we can pull up, please, INQ000654319.
So this is an email from Stuart Glassborow who was based in Number 10 but I understand he was seconded from the Treasury; is that right?
Dr Ben Warner: I think – I don’t know whether Stuart was seconded but he worked in Number 10 during the time I was in Covid.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you, and we can see in this email here, which is sent to Clare Lombardelli, the Chief Economic Adviser during the pandemic, introducing you and the work you’ve done to the Treasury. Broadly, were the Treasury receptive to the support which you offered them?
Dr Ben Warner: I would say that in my interactions, Treasury were the least receptive of the government departments.
Counsel Inquiry: Why do you think that was?
Dr Ben Warner: I don’t know.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you, that document can be taken down.
Can I ask you, please, about your observations about the Treasury’s capabilities in digital and data and technology?
Dr Ben Warner: Specifically in digital and data and technology, they did not have, I believe, a digital and data or technology team. And by that I mean a team that can build out either modern data infrastructure or technological products.
Counsel Inquiry: We’ve heard from Mr Benford this morning, who acknowledged that even by the time he was in role in November ‘20, there was a lack of data science strategy, but also nobody in the position of a Chief Data Officer; were they also things which you observed?
Dr Ben Warner: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: And how do you think that impacted on the economic response to the pandemic?
Dr Ben Warner: I think that having modern data systems and analytical capabilities to go alongside that will only help improve decision making.
Counsel Inquiry: Did you see, in your – I understand you left your role as a special adviser in May ‘21, didn’t you?
Dr Ben Warner: Yes.
Counsel Inquiry: Did you see any improvement in that capability in the Treasury over your time there?
Dr Ben Warner: During my time in Number 10, I worked less with the Treasury, towards the end. I do know that they had stood up a data science hub and I believe actually 10DS, and the people working in 10DS, which I’m not leading at this point, Laura Gilbert is leading, were supporting those efforts, but I’m not heavily involved.
Counsel Inquiry: So because you were unable to work with the Treasury that closely and like you say, you weren’t heavily involved, was it difficult to assess their capabilities across the pandemic?
Dr Ben Warner: I obviously can assess only what I saw during the pandemic and where I interacted with the Treasury. I wouldn’t want to make broad arching statements as to the whole of the capability or capacity of the Treasury in these different areas.
Counsel Inquiry: I understand in October of 2020 you, along with colleagues, carried out an analytical review.
Can we have that on screen, please. It’s INQ000196003.
The review of – this is a review of consensus statements, isn’t it, I think?
Dr Ben Warner: So I believe that what I’ve tried to do here is I talked to a large number of people across the analytical and science establishment, and different departments, to try to get an idea of what the major problems, the frictions, and things that we could improve upon, and then this, the idea of this statement is to bring it together into one piece of paper that everyone could sort of agree to.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you. And you identify some of those difficulties, including:
“Spending decisions and procurement creates friction in the system.”
Can you explain what’s meant by that, please.
Dr Ben Warner: Yes. So as you can see in the recommendation, you can see I speak to an analytical structure, and by this I mean who was in charge in government of being able to say, “Okay, we’re going to spend a large amount of money on a study”? So if you take, for example, the ONS infection study, that is a really good piece of analytical work that was carried out in government, going from data collection all the way to building out a graph that Prime Minister can make decisions on. But it’s a substantial amount of spending.
If we were to, say, for instance, say, “Okay, well, we want a similar study on – to understand where infection is occurring”, who would be the person to make that decision? How would we get the budget and the approval to actually do that?
And this is what I’m talking about in the spending decisions.
We were – at this point in time, when I talked to people who were involved in trying to procure surveys of the public behaviour and public attitude to our responses in Covid, they spoke to how they were struggling to be able to procure surveys at that point and that the process was too slow.
So the point we’re making here is that a lot of the – the – both decisions on what we spend money on, and then actually being able to spend that money to gain the data or the information or the tools or technology we needed was too slow and that was causing frictions, so slow-down in the system.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you. Another comment made in this document is that:
“A large amount of work feels almost adversarial (Health v economic) rather than bringing together into a single view.”
Can you elaborate on that, please.
Dr Ben Warner: I think that the best analytical work is always done when you bring together things at – at a low level, and bring different information from different sectors to be able to bring it together into a single systematic view. And I think we weren’t doing that. What we were ending up with is: pack on one item, pack on another item. So a siloed approach. And I think that that creates the impression it’s adversarial, whereas it’s not.
Counsel Inquiry: And in terms of being adversarial, does that contribute to a low-trust environment amongst those teams?
Dr Ben Warner: I don’t – here, I think that I’m using “adversarial” to mean sort of against each other, rather than adversarial as we might use it in relation to two different groups discussing.
Counsel Inquiry: We’ve heard this morning about the work of the Directorate General for Analysis, which helped to bring together different perspectives on analysis into a single team to put forward a single picture of analysis. Did you support the work of that team?
Dr Ben Warner: I think, if you look to this document being written in September, and then you look at the work that Rob Harrison carried out through the time that I was in Number 10, you can see that he actually managed to solve and actually bring together a number of these different – and solve a number of these different problems.
Counsel Inquiry: So do you agree a team such as that is essential in any future crises?
Dr Ben Warner: I think that we have to be building a systematic approach always. Indeed, in my time in Number 10, we worked on how we could bring together different teams, not – it’s just not about analysis; it’s about people who are experts in policy, in delivery, in law, bringing together different people from multi-discipline teams to be able to apply that to the problem. So that’s the case both in crisis but also just in government.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you. I want to ask you now about a topic which we’ve already heard a little bit about today, the use of a toy model, by both the analysis team but also in Treasury. Now, as I understand it, this was a simplistic model which was used to improve the commissioning process to SPI-M; is that right?
Dr Ben Warner: I believe that over time, people thought that it could be used for the commissioning process of SPI-M.
Counsel Inquiry: Can we have, please, INQ000654337 on the screen. Thank you.
This was an email sent from you to Rob Harrison on model, where you say:
“… I think HMT analysts are on the wrong side of this one.”
What did you mean by that?
Dr Ben Warner: By this, I mean that I disagree with the point of view that HMT analysts are taking.
Counsel Inquiry: Well, what was happening? What point of view?
Dr Ben Warner: Actually, the attachments to this document are around vaccine rollout and the impact of vaccine rollout. So this document could be referring to, I think, that HMT analysts believe that vaccine rollout will have a different effect to where I think the consensus view of the scientific expertise is, or that the HMT analysts
are using the toy model to, or they’re – maybe whatever
tools they are using, to create the wrong impression
within the Treasury as to the impact of vaccines.
Counsel Inquiry: So did you have some concerns about how the toy model
was being used by the Treasury?
Dr Ben Warner: You can see in my statement that I refer to these
concerns.
Counsel Inquiry: Can you just briefly explain what those concerns were?
Dr Ben Warner: Well, as you can see in my statement, Patrick Vallance
says that, along the lines of “Use of this toy model in
this way might lead to misleading information for January ‘21, after there’d been some use of the toy 12 decision makers.”
Counsel Inquiry: And could we also have on screen, please, INQ000196028.
Thank you.
This is an email from Angela McLean who is one of
the stakeholders of the toy model, I believe, who’d sent
an email saying:
“I have emailed Chris and Patrick saying HMT changed
the model after I QA’d it and I don’t know how.”
She then goes on to say – to be very critical about
her view of HMT’s modelling and that the approach “has
no endorsement from me.”
Were those concerns you shared?
Dr Ben Warner: My concerns are because I have a great amount of respect
and trust in Angela. She was incredibly useful, incredibly helpful in her advice she posed to me in Covid. When somebody like that sends an email like that, I think that anyone should be concerned.
Counsel Inquiry: This was obviously an issue where there was a number of different viewpoints and it was a sensitive issue, wasn’t it, because there was a lot of concern about the risk of using the toy model in a particular way; is that right?
Dr Ben Warner: I don’t … I think that we were always striving to come up with the best possible answers and being able to solve the problems that decision makers had about how the possible trends or scenarios that the epidemic would go – how it would propagate. My opinion was always that it was better putting an expert like Angela Maclean in front of the Chancellor or the PM so she could answer the questions, rather than simply giving them some sort of model that doesn’t really represent the real world.
Indeed that’s why I produced Angela McLean directly to the PPS of the Chancellor.
Counsel Inquiry: In fact, there was a positive outcome, as I understand it, in that there was a commission drawn up which went to SPI-M to ask particular questions to assist the Chancellor; is that right?
Dr Ben Warner: I think that – I wouldn’t necessarily say that was a positive outcome, there were always commissions going to SPI-M. The question would be –
Counsel Inquiry: Sorry, rather than using the toy model to come up with those answers?
Dr Ben Warner: The … I don’t know if – I mean, a commission is always going to SPI-M asking questions. Whether the toy model helped in answering better questions or not, I have no opinion on, or I don’t know because I wasn’t involved in the commission – writing that commission.
Counsel Inquiry: This was quite a tense issue, wasn’t it, amongst the analysts and in particular the Treasury? There was a strong feeling about how the Treasury used it; is that fair?
Dr Ben Warner: I wouldn’t – I think that there – because of the nature of where we are in the collaboration between the Covid analysis – the taskforce and HMT, where HMT are getting more involved, there is more documentation and more interaction, but actually I wouldn’t have said that this is the tensest of issue, it’s sort of – it’s just because it’s a visible issue.
Counsel Inquiry: How was this issue resolved within the Directorate General of Analysis team?
Dr Ben Warner: I’m not the right person to answer that question.
Counsel Inquiry: Do you agree that it’s an example of how the Directorate General brought different perspectives together when impacts – when previously there might have been a slight tension between two competing views about an issue?
Dr Ben Warner: I think it’s a good example of how, over time, Rob did a really good job of starting to bring Treasury into the tent and how that helped to make better decisions.
Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.
Dr Warner, just one final question from me. Do you have any additional – other than those helpfully set out in your statement, do you have any additional observations or reflections you’d like to share with the Inquiry?
Dr Ben Warner: I think that it’s really important that we realise that to build out good analytical structures, we need very good analytical leaders, and we need to give them the support and empower them. I think that, you know, what we see is when Rob Harrison, who has the right capabilities, joins the Covid Taskforce, it makes a massive difference, and I think that we need to make sure we can further empower those people.
And then, actually, if you look at that consensus statement that we read out earlier, it’s also about making sure that those – there is enough capacity in those teams. Often in Covid the analysts would try to do their best job but they were just sort of hand to mouth at times. And so how we can build out both the capability and the capacity in government to do – be able to do the great – the analysis that needs to be done, whether in a crisis or business as usual, I think is crucial.
Ms Wilson: Thank you, Dr Warner.
Those are all my questions, my Lady.
Lady Hallett: I have no questions, and there are no other questions to be asked.
Thank you very much for your help, Dr Warner. I’m sorry that you had to wait until the end of the day.
The Witness: All right. Thank you.
Lady Hallett: Very well, I shall return at 10.30 on Monday, 1 December. Thank you.
(3.22 pm)
(The hearing adjourned until 10.30 on Monday, 1 December 2025)