Furlough bill ‘could hit £40bn in three months’
The government’s scheme to cover 80 per cent of the salary of furloughed workers could cost up to £40bn in just three months, a thank tank has said.
The Resolution Foundation analysed new data from the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) which suggests more businesses than first thought are furloughing staff.
One fifth of companies who responded to the BCC’s survey are now planning to furlough all their staff, up from 17 per cent in the last survey, while 37 per cent said they would furlough between at least three-quarters of workers in the coming week.
Torsten Bell, chief executive of the Resolution Foundation, said: “The cost of the scheme depends on firms’ take-up and the length of time workers need to be furloughed for.
“But with recent surveys implying that at least a third of the private sector workforce could be paid through the scheme, it is likely to cost as much as £30 billion to £40 billion over three months.”
