Homes are raided by PPE fraud probe cops
»»‘Year-long investigation’ »»Documents are seized
ADDRESSES in London and the Isle of Man have been raided by the National Crime Agency as part of a criminal probe into PPE supply during the pandemic.
It is understood a special unit within the NCA has been looking into the allegations for a year.
Warrants were executed at four addresses on the Isle of Man along with properties in London. No arrests were made but officers seized documents and electronic devices.
It is a new twist in a series of scandals linked to the Government’s £15billion spending on PPE.
The Department of Health has previously been accused of cronyism and waste, with billions spent on “VIP” contracts without proper scrutiny, and billions of items bought that were unusable by the NHS.
The Isle of Man police force confirmed it took part in co-ordinated raids “in support of an NCA investigation”, adding it “executed search warrants at four addresses in the Isle of Man”.
The NCA said it “does not routinely confirm or deny the existence of investigations”.
But it is believed the probe is being carried out by officers with expertise in crossborder and financial crime. It is likely interviews with individuals could follow in the coming weeks. The NCA, which targets only serious and organised crime, has no jurisdiction on the Isle of Man, which is a self-governing British Crown dependency and a tax haven. The Tories have previously come under fire for handing out billions of pounds worth of contracts without proper scrutiny and for running a “VIP lane” for personal protective equipment suppliers which was ruled illegal this year. Just 55 per cent, 17billion out of 31billion PPE items received in the UK by the health department,
went to health and social care staff, figures showed in March. Around 1.5billion PPE items have passed their expiry date and a further 3.6billion are being stored as they are unsuitable for frontline use.
In November, our sister paper the Mirror revealed the Department of Health was paying £1million a day to store unused PPE. It spent £7million last summer buying shipping containers in a bid to cut PPE storage costs.
The costs have fallen but are still around £7million a month.
Labour MP Meg Hillier said: “The numbers are staggering – over 30billion items of PPE received, with five billion more on the way, and 3.6billion items that can’t be used by frontline services.
“Storage alone has cost over £700million, with [the Department of Health] continuing to spend £7m a month storing PPE it doesn’t need.”
The National Audit Office probe into PPE contracts found over half the VIP suppliers provided goods unsuitable for use. The NAO found there was “an extremely over-heated global market, with desperate customers… pushing up prices and buying huge volumes of PPE”.
The Department of Health said: “Our priority... has been saving lives, and we have delivered over 19.1billion items of PPE to frontline staff to keep them safe.
“Too much PPE was preferable to too little in the face of a... dangerous virus, given this was essential to keep our NHS open and protect as many people as possible.”
It added it expects to “recover significant amounts” by clawing back costs from suppliers over contracts in dispute.
The department is continuing to spend £7million a month storing PPE it doesn’t need LABOUR MP MEG HILLIER ON THE MASSIVE EXPENDITURE