Thread by @JolyonMaugham

Remember the story of Matt Hancock and Alex Bourne, the publican turned medical equipmemt supplier, a photo of whose pub Mr Hancock kept on his office wall?

Well yesterday, Mr Hancock went on the attack. He said Alex Bourne "never got a contract from the Government" and that it was a "fabrication pushed by the Labour Party" and "a load of rubbish".

Well, in a funny sort of way Hancock is telling the truth. If you look for contracts that Bourne's company, Hinpack, won you won't find any.

But in another sort of way, he isn't telling the truth. And the truth is far, far worse.

Another company, called Alpha Laboratories, did win a contract with Matt Hancock's Department.

And if you look at the Alpha Laboratories contract you will see it says this: Alpha Laboratories agrees to sub-contract the manufacturing of the Goods to an entity which we can't know because it was blanked out before publishing.

But a small bird gave me a copy of the contract in its original form and it said this: the contract between the Government and Alpha Laboratories stipulated the manufacturing had to be by Alex Bourne's Hinpack.

Of course, had a contract worth tens of millions been given directly by the Government to a Minister's pal we would know (partly because @GoodLawProject successfully sued and forced Government to publish contracts).

So, instead, the Government gave the contract to their pal via Alpha Laboratories in such a way that you were supposed never to find out.

Except for the work done by the Guardian theguardian.com/world/2021/mar… - oh, and that small bird.

Ooft. Matt Hancock asked by @AnnelieseDodds to return to the Commons and explain why he misled Parliament.

Well, Matt Hancock has returned to Parliament to answer @AnnelieseDodds and he's now told a straight lie. He says "the Department of Health does not have a say in sub-contracting arrangements" but...

... in the contract that the Department of Health entered into *it specified* that the sub-contractor would be Alex Bourne's company Hinpack Limited.

Indeed, that is exactly the thing that the thread points out - that Bourne's involvement was shielded behind Alpha Laboratories.

(Conveniently redacted contract here. atamis-1928.cloudforce.com/sfc/p/#0O00000…)

In case that link isn't working you can see the contract - stripped of all the bits that embarrass Government - here contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/notice/3390c01…