Nearly £50m Of Taxpayers’ Money Paid By NHS

Nearly £50m of taxpayers’ money paid by NHS to outsourced firm assessing vaccine harm claims Nearly £50 million of public funds has been paid by the NHS to an outsourced firm that assesses claims of medical harm allegedly caused by vaccines almost eight times the original estimate for the work and far more than has been paid in compensation to claimants so far, has found. The NHS contracted Crawford & Company Adjusters to handle medical assessments for people claiming severe harm from vaccines under the Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme (VDPS).
The original five-year contract was expected to cost around £6 million but by early 2026 nearly £50 million has been paid out to the firm. That huge bill comes despite only a small fraction of claims resulting in compensation estimated at roughly 1 per cent of cases so far. The money paid to Crawford is separate from payouts to people who are medically judged to have been harmed such payouts are one-off, tax-free payments of up to £120,000 under the statutory VDPS compensation scheme.
The NHS says the volume of claims far exceeded expectations when the contract was agreed. More than 22,000 claims have been submitted most linked to the AstraZeneca Covid vaccine triggering much higher assessment costs than anticipated.
Internal analysis shows monthly payments to the contractor rose sharply within a short period, with one month’s billing approaching nearly the entire original contract value.
Experts say the contract was “peculiar” because it lacked an upper cap on spending despite the uncertainties about how many claims would follow unusual for public procurement in situations of high unknown volume. With costs continuing to rise, NHS bosses reviewed the arrangement and selected a new provider, Maximus UK Services Limited, to take over medical assessments in the coming months. The new contract is expected to run for five years at an estimated £27 million still less than what has already been paid out. The NHS says this value reflects updated forecasts of ongoing claims and can be adjusted if the claim volume changes
Under the VDPS: Only about 1 % of claims have so far led to paymennt As of late 2025, around 249 people had received payouts, totalling approximately £29.8 million for vaccine harm claims. (The comparison shows spending on assessments is currently larger than total compensation delivered.)
The VDPS, established in 1979, is intended to provide a one-off payment for people left severely disabled at least 60 % disabled on the balance of probabilities due to a vaccine, without needing to prove negligence. Experts and commentators have questioned why the original contract lacked spending limits, given the uncertainty over claim numbers. Some campaigners have called for broader reform of the vaccine damage scheme, saying it is inefficient, slow and fails many claimants concerns heard in the long-running Covid public inquiry. Health Secretary Wes Streeting has indicated that potential reforms including how the VDPS operates are under review, with a related government report due to be published. for taxpayers and the NHS
The bill for outsourced assessments far outweighs compensation paid so far, highlighting a mismatch between costs of handling claims and actual payouts. Overspending risks diverting resources from frontline health services at a time when the NHS is already under financial pressure. The case raises broader questions about public contracting practices, especially when uncertainty over demand like post-pandemic claims is high.
How the vaccine harm scheme works
Under the UK’s Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme:
Individuals can receive a tax-free £120,000 payment if they are medically verified to be severely disabled due to vaccination.
The scheme is not a full compensation system claimants can separately pursue legal action if they choose.