The Department of Health and Social Care’s handling of a £122 million PPE contract came under increasing scrutiny last week as three days of testimony in the High Court laid bare a string of apparent failings in oversight, documentation, and witness evidence.
As PPE Medpro’s legal team continued its cross-examination of departmental witnesses, questions mounted over missing audit trails, contradictory statements, and key figures absent from the witness box.
Day three began with the cross-examination of Nick Graham, a member of the PPE Cell’s Closing Team who completed the official order form for the gown contract with PPE Medpro. At the centre of questioning was why the box for CE certification — a crucial regulatory marker — had been left unticked.
Graham claimed that internal guidance instructed team members not to tick further boxes if one certification had already been included, but he was unable to provide the document in question. This “guidance” has yet to be disclosed to the court.
PPE Medpro maintains that the blank CE box is significant — evidence, they argue, that CE certification with a Notified Body (NB) number was not a requirement under their contract. Graham, under pressure, conceded that the decision to leave the field blank was intentional and followed internal team instruction.
Freight knowledge gaps and missing audit trails
The spotlight then moved to Nick Parkes, a member of the government’s freight and logistics team. His testimony underscored a major gap in DHSC’s evidentiary chain. Parkes confirmed he had no personal knowledge of how the PPE Medpro gowns were handled after manufacturing. He never travelled to China, nor inspected the goods, and was based throughout the pandemic in Basingstoke.
More critically, he confirmed that the transport and handling of the gowns post-production was the responsibility of subcontractors Uniserve and Hunicorn, acting as government agents — a detail PPE Medpro argues absolves them of any responsibility for alleged contamination.
Despite repeated requests, DHSC has failed to produce a complete audit trail documenting the handling, sealing, and storage of the gowns. Parkes admitted such records should exist.
“You would expect there to be a document that would instruct, take from here, deliver to there… when you break a seal, you record having broken it and resealed it,” he told the court.
Later, Liam Hockan, a DHSC official from the Product Assurance and Quality Control team, was questioned about the decision to reject the gowns outright rather than explore whether they could be used in other NHS settings. Hockan confirmed his team never assessed whether the gowns could be repurposed as non-sterile, which PPE Medpro argues represents a missed opportunity and raises questions over the rationale behind the blanket rejection.
He also appeared unaware that the DHSC had abandoned one of its original claims — that the gowns were wrongly single-wrapped instead of double-wrapped — a key plank of the department’s case that has since been dropped.
On day four, the court heard from David Reid, Operations Director at Supply Chain Coordination Limited (SSCL), who oversaw PPE distribution and storage after February 2021. Reid described how shipping containers full of PPE were stored in sprawling open-air yards — sometimes literally in fields — where they were stacked four or five high.
This revelation could prove pivotal. The gowns eventually tested by Swann-Morton in 2022 may have been left in these conditions for up to 18 months. PPE Medpro argues this prolonged storage under uncontrolled conditions is the likely cause of any contamination — and the loss of gown sterility.
“So basically these are large open-air sites?”
“Yes,” Reid replied.
“Could they be fields?”
“Yes, at some point I think they were on fields.”
Pressed on who might know exactly what happened to the gowns after they arrived in the UK, Reid offered only speculative names of former contractors — including Nick Parkes, who had already denied such knowledge under oath.
Later that day, Jonathan Bates, a DHSC analyst, was questioned over a key spreadsheet used to estimate the cost of storing PPE Medpro’s gowns. The document, said to support the government’s claim for damages, was revealed to have been compiled primarily by a colleague, Anne Foulger — who has not been called as a witness.
Bates acknowledged that Foulger would likely be better placed to explain the figures, and admitted he hadn’t reviewed the invoices underpinning the data. The spreadsheet contained discrepancies — including a 4 million gown shortfall that disappeared and later reappeared — which have yet to be properly accounted for.
“Is it seriously your evidence that you didn’t consider the invoices before you gave that finalisation?”
“It is my evidence that I didn’t consider the individual invoices, yes.”
Day five saw Zarah Naeem of the MHRA take the stand. Naeem carried out an initial visual assessment of PPE Medpro’s gowns on 11 September 2020. Her statement contradicted DHSC’s revised claim that the inspection occurred on 2 September — a change made, Medpro argues, to fall within the 21-day contractual period for rejecting goods.
Naeem confirmed her inspection took place on 11 September and acknowledged this fell outside the time limit. She also clarified that while she gave a view on CE marking, she was not the decision-maker on whether the gowns should be released for NHS use.
“I did not have enough information to make a decision – an opinion – as to whether the gowns should have been used or not,” she told the court.
“From what I can remember… I don’t believe I was involved in the decision of actually not releasing the gowns.”
Once again, PPE Medpro raised the issue that the DHSC had failed to call Naeem’s manager, who would have had ultimate responsibility for that decision.
Mounting pressure on DHSC
With repeated references to missing documents, unanswered questions about gown storage, and the absence of key decision-makers from the witness list, PPE Medpro’s legal team is pressing the case that the government is attempting to shift blame for systemic failings during the Covid PPE procurement scramble.
The court will reconvene on Tuesday 24 June for the cross-examination of sterility experts — a critical phase that could determine whether the core of the DHSC’s case, that the gowns were unusable, will stand up to scrutiny.
