Recommendation 15

The Department told us that factoring in consideration of profit margins before these PPE contracts were awarded was not possible. While it agreed that the best way to mitigate against excessive profiteering was to build such contingencies into the contract it argued that the reality of the global market at the start of the pandemic meant that was simply not feasible.43 It also conceded that this meant that taking action retrospectively against suppliers profits was unlikely to be possible. The Department clearly still believes that it had an appropriate balance in place at the start of the pandemic that ensured some due diligence checks were performed but still enabled it to secure deals for PPE quickly.44 It said that while it is possible to look back in retrospect and reach different conclusions on decisions made, it felt it had the broad framework and risk appetite correct for the circumstances it faced.45 A more formalised due diligence process wasn’t established until May 2020 but as the NAO reported 46 out of 115 contracts awarded through the VIP lane pre-dated this.46