{"podcast":{"title":"IfG Events","slug":"ifg-events-864374","podcast_index_feed_id":864374,"rss_url":"https://feeds.megaphone.fm/PMO2793223125","website_url":"https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/","image_url":"https://megaphone.imgix.net/podcasts/986836ea-3272-11ec-8af8-8f1a01cf74d1/image/ifg-events-square-FINAL.png?ixlib=rails-4.3.1&max-w=3000&max-h=3000&fit=crop&auto=format,compress","author":"Podmasters","episode_count":399,"summary":"The Labour government has a huge majority in parliament – but Keir Starmer’s administration is also facing an incredibly complex set of policy challenges. So how can the prime minister and his team turn around public service performance? What can chancellor Rachel Reeves do to get the economy growing again? What will mission-driven government actually mean in practice? Who should be making the key decisions in Westminster – and beyond? And what will the appointment of a new cabinet secretary mean for the future direction of the civil service? From reforming how the centre of government works to the battle for the future of the civil service, from making a success of levelling up to achieve net zero goals, IfG EVENTS stimulate fresh thinking and share ideas about how government works – and how it could work better.","last_synced_at":"2026-06-26T22:19:30.228549+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/ifg-events-864374"},"episode":{"title":"Lessons from Covid: How to avoid fraud in future crises?","slug":"lessons-from-covid-how-to-avoid-fraud-in-future-crises","published_at":"2026-06-11T15:23:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/ifg-events-864374/lessons-from-covid-how-to-avoid-fraud-in-future-crises","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/ifg-events-864374","url":"https://traffic.megaphone.fm/NSR1416532388.mp3","audio_url":"https://traffic.megaphone.fm/NSR1416532388.mp3","summary":"The Covid-19 pandemic saw the government spend hundreds of billions of pounds to buy PPE, keep businesses afloat and avoid mass redundancies. In the heat of this once-in-a-generation crisis, decisions were made that enabled widespread fraud by both individuals and organisations – leading to an estimated £10.9 billion of Covid-19 spending being lost to fraud and error. In December 2024, the chancellor appointed Tom Hayhoe as the Covid Counter-Fraud Commissioner to scrutinise Covid spending, explore how public funds could be recovered and make recommendations to prevent fraud in the future. So what could government have done differently to respond quickly to the pandemic while avoiding the vast scale of fraud? What should government do now to ensure there are more robust checks and balances ahead of the next crisis? How can departments and organisations better work together to prevent fraud across the public sector? And how will cultural and technological changes since the pandemic, including the growth of AI, impact the nature of public sector fraud and government’s ability to tackle it? To discuss this and more, the IfG brought together an expert panel, including: Dr Susan Hawley, Executive Director of Spotlight on Corruption Tom Hayhoe, Chair of the NHS Counter Fraud Authority and formerly the Covid Counter-Fraud Commissioner Joshua Reddaway, Director of Fraud and Propriety at the National Audit Office Rachael Tiffen, Director of Public Sector & Learning at Cifas The event was chaired by Tim Durrant, Programme Director at the Institute for Government. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices","meta_description":"The Covid-19 pandemic saw the government spend hundreds of billions of pounds to buy PPE, keep businesses afloat and avoid mass redundancies. In the heat…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":3737,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/ifg-events-864374/episodes/lessons-from-covid-how-to-avoid-fraud-in-future-crises/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/ifg-events-864374/lessons-from-covid-how-to-avoid-fraud-in-future-crises.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}