The millions and the thousands can multiply very rapidly in this debate. I apologise, but I think you get the point. It is over £20 million in the course of a year—£770,000 each and every single day.
I gave the noble Baroness notice of my intention to ask about this. Who authorised those acquisitions? Who decided that they should stay there? How much has it cost to date to store these items? How much has been budgeted to keep them in store at that cost of £770,000 every day, and for how long will they be stored? How much of the PPE that has been bought has proved to be defective and unusable? I would also like to know, first, how the Government intend to report the money returned to public funds by defaulting PPE suppliers through the actions of the faulty contract PPE recovery unit. Secondly, individual settlements are protected by commercial secrecy, so how will Parliament and the public be notified about money returned to public funds by defaulting PPE suppliers through the actions of the faulty contract PPE recovery unit? Thirdly, how do the Government intend to provide transparency and accountability in relation to money returned to public funds by defaulting PPE suppliers through the actions of the faulty contract PPE recovery unit?
It is clear that the NHS should be subject to far greater scrutiny, transparency and accountability. For all those reasons, I support Amendments 3 and 173
spoken to by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, which include the NHS in the definitions of a public authority for the purposes of the Bill.