Ministers have denied missing out on the chance to buy thousands of potentially life-saving ventilators after a business claimed they had missed out by not responding to an email.
A Chesire based company claimed that it told authorities it could secure 25,000 ventilators but said it did not recieve a reply from the government.
Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove pledged yesterday that he would investigate the claims.
But a Government spokesman told the Telegraph that the firms in question had been spoken to and that their offers had proved not to be deliverable.
Minister last week admitted that they had missed a chance to take part in an EU-wide procurement scheme after a “communications mix-up”.
Mr Gove was asked by the BBC about a firm called Direct Access, based in Nantwich, Cheshire, which claimed it contacted the Department of Health and Social Care with an offer of 5,000 ventilators per week for three weeks, with the possibility of another 10,000 on top of that.
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Mr Gove said: “There have been one or two individuals, not those that you have mentioned but there have been one or two individuals who have been in touch with us saying they can source ventilators and then when we investigated the supply chain it appears that despite their best intentions they are not in a position to help.”
A Government spokesman later said: “We had an overwhelming response from businesses across the UK offering their support, and we are very grateful to Direct Access for their effort.
“Unfortunately Direct Access’ plans for a possible future supply of ventilators did not stand up to due diligence, so we did not take their proposal forward.”
The NHS currently has 8,000 ventilators, with another 8,000 coming on stream in the next few weeks and 10,000 more on order from Dyson, subject to approval from regulators.
Direct Access Chief Exec Steven Mifsud said: “We have no desire to detract from the Government’s strong efforts when we are in a time of global crisis… we are in a period that can be likened to wartime, we need to be supporting our Government and we will continue to do so.”
