Javid faces deadline on Randox deal

TIME is running out for ministers to come clean over meetings that led to £600million worth of Covid contracts being handed to a Tory-linked firm.

Labour accused the Government of “chaos and incompetence” after waiting since November for them to publish the details.

Health Secretary Sajid Javid has until tomorrow to release minutes and notes from a meeting between Health Minister Lord Bethell and testing firm Randox.

At the time, ministers said they had been “unable to locate” the information.

Randox, which has donated £160,000 to the Conservative Party – as well as paying disgraced former MP Owen Paterson

£100,000 a year for advice – secured testing deals at the height of the pandemic.

Records released this week show Lord Bethell had to call in experts from WhatsApp owners Facebook to help try to find messages linked to lucrative contracts.

The Government told a High Court judge in August the texts had been lost because Lord Bethell replaced his phone.

Labour’s Anneliese Dodds said: “This should have been straightforward. It’s another example of the chaos and incompetence that is paralysing this Government.”