The UK's Pandemic Response has been Hamstrung by Political Cronyism
Ben Dzialdowski / Feb 25 / UK Politics
Hancock, Sunak, Johnson & Gove
As children, we are taught the importance of being loyal to our friends and neighbours. Whilst it is valuable to take these lessons with us into adulthood, there are certain occasions and positions where helping out a mate should be secondary to other responsibilities. A prime example of when doing favours for chums should be last on the agenda is when governing a democratic nation, particularly during a viral outbreak that is highly transmittable and perilously dangerous. Sadly, our government is unable to shake the desire to help out their own. A year of COVID-19 has shone a light on the back-scratching merry-go-round that operates at the very top of our political system.
The high-stakes nature of COVID-19 policy, with its amplified health and financial implications, has exposed the rampant cronyism that runs throughout Johnson’s government. With a string of errors from PPE to free school meals coinciding with huge government contracts going to friends and donors, cronyism will be seen as one of the defining characteristics of Britain’s COVID-19 government response.
Early on in the Coronavirus outbreak, with the NHS overburdened, frontline health workers were having to wear makeshift personal protective equipment (PPE) out of bin bags and were appealing to DIY shops for visors and glasses. The acquisition of facemasks for health professionals was thus a job that required the government to act swiftly and competently in order to, in their own words “Protect the NHS, Save Lives”. A government that is mandated to serve the people is expected to do its due diligence when conducting any business, let alone one that has such great implication on public health. Yet, despite the supposed expertise and savviness of our leaders, the government managed to spend over £150m of tax-payer pounds on masks that were deemed unusable for health workers, as they did not meet the required safety standards.
On the surface, this was a simple mistake made by a government in a hurry. In reality, the details are far more sinister. The company that was awarded the £250m government contract (Prospermill), not only had zero history or experience with procuring personal protective equipment, but the founder, Andrew Mills, was an “advisor to the government”, and a “cheerleader for the international trade secretary, Liz Truss”.
Credit: New York Times
There is a time and a place for repaying personal favours, or rewarding close friends. Neither the time nor the place however is in the midst of a government pandemic-response where every decision made has major implications for the health and the lives of the public. The choice to hand a contract to one of their own was not only a gross misuse of tax revenue, it also unforgivably delayed the acquisition of vital PPE for frontline NHS workers.
The knee-jerk reaction of the government in the case of PPE-provision was not to source the most experienced suppliers. It was to grant substantial government contracts to unproven companies due to preexisting personal ties and financial ties. These informal relationships evidently take precedent over reputation and competence, as developments during the pandemic have continued to demonstrate.
The brazen handing-out of government COVID-19 contracts to friends and associates was even committed by the face of the government's COVID response, Health Secretary Matt Hancock. A friend and “former neighbour” of Hancock was granted a contract to supply specialised testing equipment, despite his company having no prior experience in medical-equipment manufacturing. The founder of the company, which was producing plastic cups and takeaway boxes at the time, ‘won’ the hefty government contract after sending a Whatsapp message to the Health Secretary - not the most rigorous vetting process for COVID-testing suppliers to say the least. Hancock has previously paid tribute to those who ‘choose to serve their neighbour’, a commandment that he seems to have taken too literally in this case, ignoring his responsibility to serve the general public first and foremost.
It would be remiss, when discussing government cronyism during the pandemic, to omit Dominic Cummings, a man who is almost synonymous with pandemic-scandal. Cummings embodied government cronyism, giving a former colleague and the co-author of the 2019 Conservative manifesto almost £1 million in COVID Contracts, without releasing them for competitive tender. Tacit agreements and informal relationships between government and business have long since tarnished our democracy, but in terms of the pandemic, the most damaging effect of the “chumocracy” may well have come from personal relationships within the government itself. The protection and support given to Mr Cummings after his Barnard Castle visit practically shattered government authority and annihilated any sense of war-time togetherness that they had been aiming to foster.
After Cummings was caught, after his feeble ‘eye test’ excuses, after the whole nation had seen through his lies, the government made the equally weak, and ultimately damaging position to stand by their mate and defend Mr Cummings. Whilst this did not undermine the democratic process like the prior incidents of cronyism, it did completely undermine the government message of “Stay at home, protect the NHS, save lives”. The damage was done when Cummings was not brought to justice immediately, when instead, the Prime Minister stated that he had acted “responsibly, legally, and with integrity”. The public were right to feel that “there can’t be one rule for people like Dominic Cummings, and another for everyone else”. The government chose to protect their mate over protecting their message, and we have seen tens of thousands of breaches of lockdown in the months since.
Cronyism is not new in British politics. There have always been underhand deals struck in smoke-filled-rooms. The pandemic has only exposed the way in which cronyism influences government action, even when public health is on the line. While COVID-19 emergency protocols allow for the fast-tracking of certain response-contracts, where this defence collapses is when we consider the appropriateness of whom these contracts were given to. Not only the aforementioned friends of Hancock, Cummings and Lizz Truss, but also the choices to give a pest control company a £32 million contract to supply PPE, and to hand a 7-week-old firm linked to a Conservative peer £122 million in PPE contracts. Such inappropriate recipients prove that these ‘emergency’ decisions were not rushed in order to secure the best possible response.
Of course, the distribution of government contracts is not simply based on friendship and loyalty. There are far more nuanced reasons for the uncontested handing out of million-pound contracts, one crucial deal-breaker seems to be whether you have donated to the Conservative party.
With Redditors proving the stock market to be more volatile than ever, perhaps donating money to the Conservative Party is a savvier investment at the moment. With the government handing out £881 million in contracts to “individuals who have donated a total of £8.2 million… in recent years”, Johnson certainly seems eager to greatly repay those who give significant sums to his party.
Notable donors who have received healthy contracts include Paul Walsh, a man who recently stepped down as chairman of Chartwells (a subsidiary of Compass), the company at the centre of the Free School Meals scandal, and the same company that has received £350m in contracts since 2016. Walsh was a public backer of the Conservative Party, and a donor to boot.
When the Housing Secretary grants planning permission for a £1bn property scheme two weeks before the developer donates thousands to the Conservative Party, the ‘emergency COVID response’ excuse is not there to hide behind. These relationships between Party and donor highlight the corruption that exists beyond the COVID crisis and will continue to disrupt democracy when it is over.
Final Words
Whilst the quantitative impact of cronyism on the UK’s COVID cases cannot be measured, the billions of pounds in the pockets of Conservative donors and mates can. Against the backdrop of these contracts, the insufficient food parcels and unsuitable PPE are a damning indictment of the government. When the nation saw an emergency, the government saw an opportunity to repay favours and line the pockets of their friends. Government cronyism has undermined British democracy and its own authority and contributed to the UK having the highest death rate in the world in January 2021, nearly a year on since the first case in this country.
This pandemic has taught us a great deal about our government. They can be loyal, dependable and generous, it all depends if you know them personally or have the money to support them. With this in mind, and with the Conservative Party miraculously still ahead in the opinion polls, now may be as good a time as ever to send Mr Johnson that friend request.