Government racks up £100m bill responding to Covid inquiry

However, the TaxPayers' Alliance has branded it a waste of money and the Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice UK said while the work being done was vital, public inquiries generally needed to become more efficient and less adversarial.

The costing estimates do not include time officials spend preparing and appearing as witnesses in person.

More than half the £101m spend has been on legal fees – including bringing in external lawyers.

An inquiry source said that to some extent the spending reflected the defensive attitude of the government towards the inquiry.

Inquiry chair Baroness Hallett and the inquiry legal team have criticised government departments for delays providing documents and blocking the release of key information.

This most famously came to a head in 2023, when the inquiry and government ended up in the High Court over the government's refusal to release Boris Johnson's WhatsApp messages, diaries and notebooks. The government lost the case.

Sources said the government had set up a "huge operation" which had at times seemed "hostile and difficult" to the inquiry.

A Cabinet Office spokeswoman said: "The government is fully committed to supporting the work of the inquiry and to learning lessons from the pandemic to ensure the UK is better prepared for a future pandemic."

The Cabinet Office argues the court case was brought to gain clarity on a point of principle - the right of an inquiry to request information that the provider considers irrelevant.

John O'Connell, chief executive of the TaxPayers' Alliance think tank, said: "It's an absolute disgrace that ministers have burnt through an extra £100m on top of what the inquiry itself has already spent.

"These new figures show the total cost to taxpayers will be far higher than previously feared.

"Ministers must urgently get a grip on the spiralling costs of the Covid Inquiry and commit to delivering answers swiftly and efficiently."

A spokesman for the Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice UK said the work of the inquiry was "vital" and any costs would be recouped many times over in the future if lessons were learned by reducing the economic impact of the next pandemic as well as saving lives.

But he added: "The inquiry process is far from perfect."

He said the group supported the Hillsborough Law, which is working its way through parliament and strengthens the legal duty on public authorities to assist public inquiries.

He said public inquiries like the Covid one needed to become more efficient and less adversarial.

"Only then can we bring down the cost of future inquiries while protecting access to justice."

A spokesman for the Covid inquiry said: "The inquiry is unlike any previous public inquiry. It was given a very broad scope because it is investigating multiple aspects of a pandemic that affected everyone in society."

He said the chair had made clear at the start that it would take time and have significant cost, but it was working faster than any other public inquiry of comparable size, pointing out all the hearings would be finished by spring 2026.

He said it would result in recommendations that are intended to better protect the UK when the next pandemic strikes, but would not comment on the nature of the relationship with the government.