Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what proportion of personal protective equipment for the health service has been sourced from domestic suppliers in each of the last five months.

There has been limited domestic manufacture of personal protective equipment (PPE) to date. Lord Deighton is leading the Government effort to unleash the potential of British industry to manufacture PPE for the health and social care sectors. We have identified opportunities and sourced new supply channels for materials to make PPE at pace, enabling new manufacturing to commence. The Government is also working to support the scale-up of engineering efforts for small companies capable of contributing to supplies.

The Government has signed contracts to manufacture over 2 billion items of PPE through United Kingdom-based manufacturers, including aprons, facemasks, visors and gowns and has already taken delivery of products from new, certified UK manufacturers. These will contribute to the national effort to meet the unprecedented demand for PPE.