Paterson’s links to Covid test supplier ‘not a conflict’, Bethell tells inquiry

Ex-MP Owen Paterson’s involvement with a company awarded a contract to supply millions of Covid tests was not a conflict of interest, a former minister told the UK Covid-19 Inquiry.

Randox was awarded a contract by the Department of Health and Social Care to supply around 2.7 million tests over a 12-week period in March 2020.

Mr Paterson quit as an MP in 2021 after he was found to have breached rules on paid advocacy when he lobbied ministers on behalf of Randox.

Former health minister Lord Bethell told the Covid inquiry that he was not sure when he became aware of Mr Paterson’s involvement with Randox but said it “wasn’t a secret” as it was published in his register of interests.

“I think that if someone has put something in their register of interest and are utterly transparent about it, then it doesn’t qualify as a conflict of interest,” he said.

Lord Bethell, whose role at the time involved overseeing the testing programme, said he authorised civil servants to start contract negotiations with Randox on March 24.

He called Randox the “standout candidate for working in the diagnostic area” and said the public attention over the lobbying scandal had “demonised” the company.

He said: “I think that the attention around Randox has been highly politically motivated. I think it’s a great shame that a British company has been demonised in that fashion, other British companies will take that lesson and be extremely reluctant to step up to the challenge in the future. And I think that it’s a great shame what’s happened to a good company.”

He was asked if he could suggest any measures to ensure that public confidence in the procurement process is not lost in future.

“We were falling over ourselves to be as transparent and clear-cut and working within the regulations as possible,” he said.

“Everyone knew that there was going to be an inquiry from the very beginning… We knew that we were going to be sitting in a chair like this, answering questions like this.”

He said the Government was “incredibly thorough” in taking advice from officials and “extremely cautious about everything we did.”

“And in our handling of Randox, I think that that.. couldn’t have been a better example,” he added.

Lord Bethell was also asked about an email from Matt Hancock from June 2020 asking him to speak to Alex Bourne, who he called a “very impressive guy”.

The then-health secretary Mr Hancock later faced questions about his involvement in helping Mr Bourne, the former landlord of his local pub, to obtain a multimillion-pound contract to supply test tubes for NHS Covid-19 testing.

Lord Bethell said the email was “not actually a pitch for work” and that he had “no idea” whether it led to any contract being awarded to Alpha Laboratories or Mr Bourne’s company, Hinpack.