MPS query £800m contracts handed to Covid-19 test firm

A COVID-19 testing company at the centre of the Boris Johnson sleaze row last year has been thrust back into the spotlight after MPS claimed it was “impossible to have confidence” that almost £800m worth of contracts were awarded fairly.

MPS on the public accounts committee (PAC) have released a report into how health ministers agreed Covid deals with Randox Labs, a diagnostics company which provided testing kits during the pandemic.

The company last year was at the centre of a government lobbying row, after it emerged that Owen Paterson, then MP for North Shropshire, had lobbied on behalf of Randox for testing contracts. Mr Johnson had initially sought to protect the MP over claims he had broken lobbying rules, although Mr Paterson later resigned.

In today’s report, MPS said there had been “woefully inadequate recordkeeping” by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) when it came to the Randox deals, which together were worth up to £777m.

“The department did not show any evidence of taking any care over potential conflicts of interest when it awarded contracts to Randox. This was despite officials being aware of Owen Paterson’s contacts with Rt Hon Matt Hancock MP, the then Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, as a paid consultant for Randox while he was still a sitting MP, and the hospitality Mr Hancock received from Randox in 2019.”

The PAC called for ministers to step up efforts to make sure conflicts of interest are recorded and acted on. The MPS also said guidance on making sure companies are not drawing in excessive profits needed to be strengthened. Randox’s profits swelled by more than a hundred times in the year to June 30 2021, hitting £177m, the PAC said.

A spokesman for Randox said the PAC report was “deeply flawed”.

They said Randox had been “uniquely situated to respond to the national need when Covid-19 emerged in early 2020 … At no stage, did the PAC make any contact whatsoever with Randox. Consequently many elements of its report relating to Randox are false, based as they are, on wrong and unchecked assumptions about the company. For that reason, they and any publications arising from them are the subject of a legal complaint,” they added.

A DHSC spokesman said: “There are robust rules and processes in place to ensure that conflicts of interest do not occur… There is no evidence that the Government’s contracts with Randox were awarded improperly.”