Extra: The Treasury and the Covid crisis

Inside Briefing with the Institute for Government

Institute for Government

News, Politics, Government

4.6 • 252 Ratings

🗓️ 26 April 2023

⏱️ 43 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Do you remember being told to stay at home? Or becoming very familiar with the word “furlough”? How about all those assurances that the Government was following the science? And were you persuaded when ministers urged you to Eat Out to Help Out? The Treasury was at the heart of the Government’s response to the pandemic, rapidly designing and rolling our policies designed to protect jobs, support people and help businesses through an extraordinary – and unprecedented – time. But it was also wary of sharing its analysis, wary of external advice, and reluctant to work openly with other Government departments. To mark the publication of a major new IfG report into the Treasury’s Covid response, Financial Times economics editor Chris Giles joins this special episode of Inside Briefing for a deep dive into how the UK’s finance ministry performed during the pandemic – and asks what lessons needs to be learned. Presented by the IfG’s Emma Norris with Gemma Tetlow and Olly Bartrum. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello and welcome to this episode of Inside Briefing, the podcast from the Institute for Government.
0:13.5	I'm Emma Norris, the deputy director at AFG. Remember when the then Prime Minister told us all to stay at home?
0:19.8	Then reassured us that the government was following the science? How about when the then- Minister told us all to stay at home, then reassured us that the government was following the science?
0:22.6	How about when the then-Chancellor introduced us all to the word furlough?
0:26.6	And what about being encouraged to eat out to help out?
0:29.6	Thankfully, it all seems like a different era, that the government's response to the COVID pandemic shaped all of our lives,
0:35.6	and for many people, the impact of its decisions
0:37.5	continues to shape our lives. At the heart of the government's response was the Treasury,
0:42.3	scrambling to design and roll out huge economic support packages. But how did the Treasury
0:47.2	go about taking those decisions and coming up with those policies? Was it following the
0:51.3	science or was its focus on the balance sheet? And how well did it work with other departments during a time of huge strain on government?
0:58.7	Well, the Treasury's response to the pandemic is the focus of a major new report from the Institute for Government
1:03.1	and this special episode of Insight Briefing is going to take a closer look at what that report found
1:08.0	and what it says should be done differently.
1:10.4	Joining me are the authors of the report, IFG's chief economist Gemma Tetlow,
1:14.5	IFG's senior economist, Oli Bartram,
1:16.5	and I'm delighted that we're also joined by Chris Giles,
1:19.1	the economics editor at the FT,
1:20.9	who was, of course, reporting on the Treasury's response throughout the crisis.
1:24.3	Hi, Chris.
1:25.0	Hello.
1:25.7	So before we start diving into the specifics, Olli, why did we
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Institute for Government, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Institute for Government and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.