Covid-19: Contracts and Public Inquiry

Debate between Gavin Newlands and Sarah Owen

Wednesday 7th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

It is nearly 50 years ago, long before I was born, incidentally—[Interruption.] It was a good decade before, I say to colleagues shouting to the contrary. It is nearly 50 years since the Poulson scandal began. It was a tawdry affair with politicians, civil servants, local government and industry all enmeshed in a network of bribery and corruption that rocked the establishment through the early ’70s, yet the amounts involved, even allowing for inflation, are miniscule when compared with the moneys that have flowed through the UK Government and been disbursed to the chosen ones.

Poulson went to prison for three years for paying around £500,000 in bribes to secure building contracts. Last November’s National Audit Office reports alone looked into £17.3 billion-worth of covid-related contracts, while the most recent total is over £31 billion. Those reports painted a picture of procurement policies that were simply ignored and skirted, where managing risk went out the window. They also lay bare the golden trough that was laid on for those fortunate enough to enjoy VIP status and the ear of Ministers or Government officials. Those able to use that high-priority lane were 10 times more likely to be successful in securing a contract than those unlucky enough to have to do things by the book.

Giving favoured companies and individuals VIP status and allowing them to jump over procedures put in place for mere mortals was a happy event for one pub landlord, who counted the former Health Secretary, the right hon. Member for West Suffolk (Matt Hancock), as one of his regulars—so regular that he appears to have had the former Minister’s mobile number and sent him a message selflessly offering his firm’s services. A few weeks later, those services were indeed taken up by a medical products distributor involved in supplying the NHS. At least that particular individual appears to have done nicely over recent months, because not everyone these days can afford a £1.3 million country house.

The National Audit Office report on Government procurement in the first months of the pandemic makes for damning reading. The word “inadequate” appears too often for comfort. At various points, the NAO mentioned that there was

“insufficient documentation on key decisions”,

and that

“contracts…have not been published in a timely manner”,

as well as

“diminished public transparency…the lack of adequate documentation”,

and so on, and so on.

No one doubts the exceptional—perhaps unique—situation that the Government found themselves in last year. It is clear that emergency procedures are justified in a public health emergency. Indeed, we support them and have used them in Edinburgh, but that does not give Ministers and the Government the right to excuse themselves from basic norms of transparency and accountability and throw billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money—or rather, future taxpayers’ money, given the levels of borrowing needed—at companies who, in many cases, turned out to make Del Boy or even Arthur Daley look legitimate.

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?