Unions and anti-corruption campaigners react to damning Covid Inquiry report

Yesterday, 15 July, the Covid Inquiry published its latest update — this time focusing on the Johnson government’s failure to secure adequate personal protective equipment (PPE). In response, both anti-corruption campaigning organisations and the unions representing affected hospital workers have been swift to issue their condemnation.

As the Canary’s Joe Glenton previously reported:

Boris Johnson’s government wasted £10bn on unusable personal protective equipment (PPE), the Covid inquiry report has found. Inquiry chair Heather Hallett also slammed the then-Conservative government’s use of firms with Tory ‘VIP’ connections to fulfil major PPE contracts.

BMA: Government performance ‘an omnishambles’

Reacting to the Module 5 report, British Medical Association (BMA) council deputy chair Dr Emma Runswick said:

What we saw unfold was an omnishambles; a scramble in procurement, supply and distribution, resulting in chaotic and slapdash approaches to try to get PPE to those who needed it.

Yet we know they often didn’t receive it. Time and time again, from the beginning of the pandemic, and right through the multiple waves of 2020, doctors and our colleagues were left without the PPE needed to protect them and their patients from a fatal disease. This impact was uneven, with women and ethnic minority doctors either unable to access suitable fitting PPE, or indeed, facing greater pressure to work without proper protection.

Runswick also highlighted that the report “makes a number of positive recommendations” for preparation. However, those recommendations served to highlight the UK’s current sorry state:

it is shocking, six years on, to see in black and white that still not enough is being done to ensure both the size and quality of the PPE stockpile, or prepare more widely.

A new pandemic, as well as wider global risks in an increasingly hostile world, remain very real threats to our healthcare systems and the safety of our population. Yet we remain unprepared – both in terms of supplies like PPE, but also in the state of the very buildings we work in, the facilities to provide critical care, and the staffing capacity we have to treat people.

Royal College of Nursing: “is unforgivable”

Meanwhile, the Royal College of Nursing’s (RCN) reaction was similarly outraged. Rose Gallagher, the RCN’s leader for infection prevention during the pandemic, said:

This report is a damning indictment of just how badly nursing staff were let down. The total failure to plan meant stockpiles of PPE were too low, while much of the equipment meant to protect our profession didn’t fit or work effectively. That so many staff were forced to repurpose shower caps, or wear bin bags in desperate attempts to protect themselves, should be marks of shame for the successive governments that left us so unprepared.

Gallagher also praised the nurses who continued in their vital work despite the dangerous position the government placed them in. The infection-prevention lead added:

Despite this litany of government failures to prepare, nursing staff continued to show up for their patients knowing the very real risk to themselves and their families. We know so many died after being sent onto wards, into care homes and into the community with inadequate protection. Meanwhile, scores more continue to live with the long-term effects of Covid to this day. It is unforgivable.

Even back in 2021, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) had already noted the disproportionate level of deaths among nursing staff. The ONS recognised 157 deaths among nurses, averaging over 50 fatalities per 100,000 members of the profession. [ED NOTE: (24.5+79.1)/2=51.8]

Anti-corruption campaigners on PPE report

Given the scandal of the bogus procurement contracts, corruption watchdogs also offered comment on the latest report. For example, Gavin Hayman – executive director of the UK Anti-Corruption Coalition’s Open Contracting Partnership — said:

The British Government bought the wrong things, from the wrong people, in the wrong way. The Inquiry has shown what happens when emergency powers, weak controls and political access collide with disastrous results. Giving huge direct awards to untested companies [specialising in lingerie, drinking straws, confectionery and the like] recommended by politicians harmed the UK’s Covid emergency response.

Likewise, Transparency International UK works with governments and businesses to tackle corruption both at home and around the world. Chief executive Daniel Bruce, who previously gave evidence to the inquiry on behalf of the UK Anti-Corruption Coalition, said:

The inquiry’s report lays bare the failings of the so-called VIP lane for PPE contracts. It confirms our earlier findings that there was systemic bias in awarding contracts to those with connections to the party of government and that, in a majority of cases, there was no objective assessment of those firms’ ability to actually deliver PPE.

The inquiry underscores the damage done to public trust by a prolonged and unnecessary failure of transparency in public spending.

It also challenges the new government to go further to guard against the risk of corruption in future emergencies.

And for PPE Medpro?

Spotlight on Corruption is a research and monitoring organisation which publishes findings on the UK’s implementation of its anti-corruption laws. Executive director Sue Hawley criticised the so-called ‘VIP Lane’:

Its ongoing use, beyond the very early stages of the pandemic, undermined trust in government, and trust in government is never more important than during a public health emergency.

VIP contracts failed at three times the rate of standard ones and cost 80% more per unit, even as nurses resorted to bin bags on the frontline. Five years on, nearly £10 billion has been written off, only one supplier has been taken to court, and the public is still owed a full accounting.

The supplier Hawley alluded to there is PPE Medpro. The firm, which has links to Tory peer Michelle Mone through her husband Doug Barrowman, is at the centre of an ongoing criminal investigation. Mone recommended the company to other ministers, who promptly awarded it over £200m in PPE contracts.

Mone and Barrowman have denied any wrongdoing. The National Crime Agency is still investigating, but hasn’t yet brought charges. However, the company has already had to pay back £148m to the government by order of the High Court.

Whilst the Covid Inquiry held a full day of hearings on PPE Medpro, it can’t yet publish the results due to restrictions surrounding the criminal proceedings.

Featured image via Senedd