Emergency Covid Contracts

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Thursday 1st July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I said in my previous answer that I am not equipped, at this notice, to answer specific questions on specific meetings in another department about which allegations are being made. What I will say to the noble Baroness, and to everyone, is that an extraordinary effort was made, and was required of government by the country—and by opposition parties, as a matter of fact—to procure material that was needed to address the Covid crisis. While criticism is made of the alleged fast-track process of urgent procurement procedures, the absolute priority was to save lives, and those procedures were in line with procurement policy. There was extreme urgency, and indeed the Government’s case that emergency procurement regulations could be used because of the extreme urgency of the Covid-19 pandemic was upheld by a judge in the High Court in a recent case.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I hope that the Government will seek to establish why there have been these administrative errors and give a full report to both Houses. I recognise that the Government had to act urgently in the circumstances in which they found themselves, but I see no reason why they needed to break existing rules. The previous Secretary of State used a personal mobile in a way that was in contravention of all the guidance given to him. There is no reason why he should not have used the official mobile. Can the Minister tell me whether the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, has been having private conversations on his mobile? Has this been investigated? If not, why not? The public need to know what is going on. If there is nothing to be worried about, let us bring it out into the open and the Government will be cleared—there will be a smell continuing if they will not investigate these issues.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the matter of the letting of contracts has been reviewed by many people and many reviews. The Boardman first review covered communications contracts, and 28 of its recommendations are complete, as of today. The Boardman second review covered areas of PPE, ventilators, vaccines, et cetera. Work is under way to implement those recommendations. The NAO found no irregularities or potential conflicts of interest involving Ministers in its report up to 31 July. I think the background is a little less perfervid than is described. As far as email is concerned, of course Ministers should have a care. All Ministers are aware of the guidance around email use. Government guidance is that official devices, email accounts and communication applications should be used for communicating classified information, but Ministers have other lives—parliamentary lives and so on—and other forms of communication may be used in conducting government business. As for my noble friend Lord Bethell, he spoke on this matter in the House on Tuesday, so I refer the noble Lord to his comments; obviously, he is best equipped to answer those kinds of charges.