Defiant Dido insists Test and Trace is a ‘success’

‘Most wasteful and inept’

DIDO Harding insisted yesterday that Test and Trace had been a ‘success’ – even though critics have claimed it has made little difference.

The former head of the £37billion contact tracing system told MPs she was ‘proud’ of the work the organisation had done.

She said it had achieved its goal of helping break the chains of Covid’s transmission.

But the baroness’s ebullient comments differ from the conclusion reached by Sage scientists – who said last October that the system had a ‘marginal’ impact on tackling the virus because it neither tests nor traces enough people.

In March, former Treasury permanent secretary Lord Macpherson accused Baroness Harding of presiding over ‘the most wasteful and inept public spending programme of all time’.

Appearing at the Commons public accounts committee yesterday, she said: ‘I would actually argue – and I do appreciate that a lot of people will find this rather incredulous given some of the way its been reported – but I would argue NHS Test and Trace has been a success.’

Baroness Harding quoted a government study suggesting the scheme has reduced transmission by 18 to 33 per cent.

Asked by MPs if NHS Test and Trace had been given too big a brief, she said: ‘It was one, not the only, tool that the Government set out as its response to Covid... NHS Test and Trace was never set up to be the single solution to Covid.’

Baroness Harding stepped down from NHS Test and Trace last month, before applying to become the new head of the NHS – a job which reports suggest she is unlikely to get.

The contact tracing system’s yearly budget is worth almost half the yearly budget for policing and public safety in the UK.