UK Covid-19 Inquiry - Module 1 report: progress update - July 2025

3. Risk assessment

Recommendation Three – A better approach to risk assessment

Chair’s recommendation:

The UK Government and devolved governments should work together on developing a new approach to risk assessment that moves away from a reliance on single reasonable worst-case scenarios towards an approach that:

• Assesses a wider range of scenarios representative of the different risks and the range of each kind of risk
• Considers the prevention and mitigation of an emergency in addition to dealing with its consequences
• Provides a full analysis of the ways in which the combined impacts of different risks may complicate or worsen an emergency
• Assesses long-term risks in addition to short-term risks and considers how they may interact with each other
• Undertakes an assessment of the impact of each risk on vulnerable people; and
• Takes into account the capacity and capabilities of the UK.

In doing so, the UK Government and devolved governments should perform risk assessments that reflect the circumstances and characteristics particular to England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and the UK as a whole.

Implementation actions and timescales set out in our January 2025 response:

• Our review and implementation of any improvements will be completed by the end of 2025.

Progress update:

• The Scottish Government review of how we can optimise use of the UK-wide risk assessment and improve our process for taking into account Scotland’s circumstances and characteristics is progressing on schedule. Implementation of any improvements identified will commence by the end of 2025, and will extend beyond 2025 to maximise effectiveness.
• On 17 June 2025, Scottish Government published the findings from a significant horizon scanning project. The “Future Trends for Scotland” report and the accompanying Trend pack describe the 60 trends likely to be important to Scotland over the next 10 to 20 years. This work involved over 100 stakeholder interviews and several sense-making workshops with a mix of external and internal stakeholders, together with a specific project focused on engaging young people.
• By publishing these findings, Scottish Government is enabling leaders across Scotland to make future-focused decisions. Scottish Government’s improvement work will also explore how these longer term trends might interact with civil contingencies risks to allow the interconnections to be understood in order to strengthen preparedness.