Recommendation 8

HM Government Not Addressed

2: PAC conclusion: The Department still lacks a stock management system that enables it to fully understand what PPE it has and where it is. 2: PAC recommendation: The Department should set out in its Treasury Minute response to the Committee how it intends to work with SCCL to build and maintain an effective stock management system that is complete and accurate in its data collection. 2.1 The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Recommendation implemented 2.2 The priority at the outset of the pandemic was getting vital provisions to the frontline. Building an end-to-end management system would have taken too long. Instead, data systems were built that enabled effective management of the programme. There are now no large volumes of new transactions to assess and manage, so a new stock management system would not add to the existing processes. 2.3 The department has undertaken a systematic and far-reaching data improvement programme, working with third-party logistics contractors to systematically assess and evaluate our data, identifying issues and correcting data gaps at source. 2.4 Responsibility for managing existing and future stock is expected to transition to Supply Chain Coordination Ltd (SCCL) in the coming months to align more fully with business- as-usual inventory management systems within existing supply chain infrastructure. 2.5 For some product types, SCCL are expected to add items to their list of ‘good to distribute’ stock; items that form part of the ongoing supply chain offer. For those items, the scope to move items into existing end-to-end inventory management processes and systems will be explored so that PPE is fully integrated into existing systems and not managed separately. 2.6 For other product types – particularly where more items are held than front line services are likely to use – the focus is on using or disposing of the remaining items efficiently. A bespoke stock management system would not help with this process; the data held on those items already exists, and a new system could only be populated with data already held. 2.7 The department and SCCL have established management information data sources to monitor and manage stock held by the programme at national level, and separate contractual data has been used to manage financial receipting and to pursue contractual matters. Following the data improvement work, the department is well placed to hand over to SCCL a 9 single, coherent and joined up view of stock held. SCCL are putting in place plans to manage disposal or ongoing distribution and sale of those products.