Scumbag 'nasty party' squanders £120 Million of 'our' money !!! on one of their own members

The bastards in government have handed £120 Million to scumbag 'nasty party' councillor to provide PPE, except that the quality of these gowns and masks fallls well below acceptable standards and are absolutely useless.

I wonder if this scumbag 'nasty party' government will ask for their money back ???



Former Tory councillor got £120m ‘VIP lane’ government contract for face shields now lying unused
The shields could not be used at all last year during the peak of the first and second waves of the pandemic

Jon Stone
Policy Correspondent
@joncstone
15 hours ago
comments


Most of the equipment was not able to be used as it wasn’t CE marked

(AFP/Getty)
A former Tory councillor was given a £120m government contract for personal protective equipment (PPE) which is now lying unused because of concerns about its quality, it has been revealed.

Steve Dechan, who owns medical device manufacturer Platform-14, had his offer to supply protective equipment from China fast-tracked through the government’s controversial “VIP” lane.

The Sunday Times newspaper reports that fewer than 1 in 400 of the face shields procured by the company on behalf of the government have been used, because the regulator does not believe they meet the right standards.

The original order for 120 million shields has delivered just 274,200 into the NHS supply chain, representing 0.23 per cent of the overall stock.

It means the shields used so far have cost the equivalent of £423 each, despite similar ones being available to buy online for less than £1.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has to authorise all PPE that is not CE marked (an EU designation that means it complies with European standards).

But the regulator said: “None of the documentation provided to HSE indicated the product to be CE marked.”

The regulator wrote to officials in September last year saying the shields “cannot enter the NHS supply chain” and repeatedly refused to approve them.

But in February, the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC) stepped in and directly approved the face shields, with 274,000 used in the NHS so far. At the height of the pandemic last year, none could be used.

Mr Dechan told The Sunday Times that the “application and usage [of the shields] is entirely a matter for the DHSC”.

He said they had met “the required standards” and added: “As an NHS supplier for nearly 10 years, we will continue to provide innovative solutions and support trusts and patients across the UK.”

The reports come amid concern about the government’s procurement during the pandemic. The National Audit Office (NAO) found that firms referred to the VIP lane were 10 times more likely to have been given government contracts to supply PPE.


The NAO, the government’s spending watchdog, said in a report in November 2020 that there was a “lack of transparency and adequate documentation of some key decisions, such as why particular suppliers were chosen, or how the government identified and managed potential conflicts of interest in the awarding of some contracts”.

Another report released by the Commons Public Accounts Committee on Sunday said that the government is still wasting vast amounts of money on PPE that is “not fit for purpose” a year and a half into the pandemic.

Official figures show that overall nearly 7 per cent of all items purchased by the DHSC have failed quality checks, while ministers are spending £6.7m every week to keep the items stored.

An eye-watering 2.1 billion items have already been found unsuitable for use in medical settings, and 10,000 shipping containers are still to be unpacked.

The same committee also warned of “significant financial risks for decades to come”, with the estimated lifetime cost of all the government’s Covid measures reaching £372bn in May 2021.





Government wasting millions on PPE that is ‘still not fit for purpose’ 18 months into pandemic
Public Accounts Committee warns taxpayer will bear ‘significant financial risks for decades to come’

Jon Stone
Policy Correspondent
@joncstone
1 day ago
comments
The government is wasting vast amounts of money PPE that is still “not fit for purpose” a year and a half into the pandemic, an influential committee of MPs has warned.

Official figures show nearly 7 per cent of all items purchased by the health department have failed quality checks while ministers are spending £6.7m every week to keep it stored.

An eye-watering 2.1 billion items have already been found unsuitable for use in medical settings and 10,000 shipping containers are still to be unpacked.

The same committee also warned of “significant financial risks for decades to come”, with the estimated lifetime cost of all the government’s Covid measures reaching £372bn in May 2021.

Dame Meg Hillier, chair of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), said too much of the “eye-watering sums” of cash being spent to combat the pandemic were going to waste.

Labour called for an immediate public inquiry on the findings of the report.

In two separate reports, the committee said that a further 8.4 billion items of PPE on order from other parts of the world have still not arrived in the UK.

And it said the government did not have a credible plan for the excess PPE that was suitable for medical use, with no evidence of a robust plan for repurposing and distributing the stock properly.

Responding to the report, the government said there are “robust processes” in place to ensure taxpayer money is spent properly. It said less than 1 per cent of PPE it had ordered was unsuitable for any use at all, distinguishing between its suitability for medical use and other uses.

Dame Meg said: “The ongoing risk to the taxpayer will run for 20 years on things like arts and culture recovery loans, let alone the other new risks that departments across Government must quickly learn to manage.”

The government has promised a public inquiry into the pandemic, but it is not expected to start until spring next year.

The PAC report said it was “clear that government cannot wait for the review before learning important lessons” and must instead present a Covid recovery plan in the autumn spending review.

Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner said the cross-party report was more evidence of Tory failure during the pandemic.

She said their approach had “resulted in tens of thousands of avoidable deaths and saw eye-watering sums of taxpayers’ money wasted on unsafe PPE and contracts handed out to their mates”.


“We cannot wait until next year for the public inquiry to start and ministers cannot kick it into the long grass and cover up their failures by refusing to hand over information hidden in personal email accounts,” she added.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “There are robust processes in place to ensure that government spending always provides value for money for the taxpayer.

“We have worked tirelessly to source life-saving PPE to protect health and care staff, and we have delivered over 12.7 billion items to the frontline at record speed. As the National Audit Office has recognised, all NHS providers they spoke to were able to get the equipment they needed in time.”