A health watchdog claimed that Michael Gove wanted to “circumvent” the regulatory process to push through a bid by James Dyson to supply NHS ventilators during the pandemic, the UK Covid-19 inquiry heard.
Gove, who was the chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (CDL), denied seeking to pressure the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) to approve the product as he gave evidence on Monday.
Reading from an email sent by Graeme Tunbridge, the director of devices at the MHRA in March 2020, the counsel to the inquiry, Richard Wald KC, said: “CDL was keen to press forward with Dyson’s proposal to a timescale that is totally unrealistic, based in part on promises made by Dyson that are already not being fulfilled.
“In addition, however, CDL did not appreciate the level of risk involved in the manufacture and use of ventilators and wanted to circumvent the expedited regulatory process that has been put in place.”
Asked whether he had been seeking to circumvent the role of the MHRA, Gove said: “No, and it’s ludicrous to think that any minister could have done.
“Just imagine the situation, if you will. A minister – Matt Hancock, I, Boris Johnson – says we want to have a potentially lethal machine in hospitals deliberately so that we can meet an arbitrary deadline. It’s inconceivable.”
Gove said that Dyson’s prototype ultimately “did not get through testing” and that “whenever confronted with brute facts about safety or otherwise, I would always accept them”.
The former minister accepted he had more “direct involvement” with Dyson’s proposal than with other applicants, but said he “could not tell the MHRA what to approve and would not”.
Elsewhere, the inquiry was shown an extract from an email from Gove’s private office that read: “MHRA and GRW [Gareth Rhys Williams, then the chief commercial officer at the Cabinet Office] to ensure that by the end of Friday, the Dyson product has been tested and approved by MHRA, a small number of products have been provided to hospitals for human testing, and the final product has started to be manufactured. GRW to escalate any blockages to ministers.”
Asked about why he had been able to give “clear instruction that not only would the Dyson product have been tested three days later, but also approved by MHRA by that time”, Gove said: “I could not tell the MHRA what to approve and would not. I think that this is the private office’s shorthand for ‘we would hope that it had been tested and if tested satisfactorily approved by the MHRA to that timescale’.
“It’s absurd to imagine that I or any other minister would instruct the MHRA, an independent regulatory agency, to approve a product. If I had told the MHRA to approve a product, they would have told me where to get off.”
Meanwhile, the inquiry heard that the senior Cabinet Office civil servant John Manzoni had been “concerned” that “indirect pressure was being placed on the MHRA to approve the supplier’s design” after a meeting with Gove, Dyson and Rhys Williams.
“I felt I had to, and did, intervene in this meeting to ensure that the MHRA approval system, as the regulatory system, was properly applied and to protect the integrity of the process,” Manzoni said in a statement.
In a separate exchange with Manzoni on 25 March that year, Rhys Williams had said he felt Gove was “being unreasonable”.
“Even if he was correct that we had delayed anything, which I don’t believe he is at all, his tone is … regrettable. But see below. It would appear that the Dyson sample is not yet ready to be shipped by them.
“MHRA could have been testing something else this evening.”
Gove also told the inquiry he did not believe that time and effort spent on Dyson’s ventilator proposal meant that the same resources could not be devoted to other bids.
The inquiry continues on Tuesday.
The inquiry previously heard that Lord Agnew, a Tory Treasury minister, had warned a senior official that ventilators might need to be bought from Dyson “so that he [could] then market [them] internationally” as “being used in UK hospitals” after the businessman spoke to Boris Johnson.
A Dyson spokesperson said last week: “Sir James Dyson responded to a personal call from the prime minister … to develop and make a medical-grade ventilator in 30 days during the national emergency.
“Dyson had no intention of manufacturing ventilators for profit. Far from receiving any commercial benefit, there was significant commercial cost to Dyson, which diverted 450 engineers away from commercial projects.
“Mercifully, treatments changed, and mass use of ventilators was no longer seen as an effective remedy, the UK government cancelled the order it had placed, and none were ever sold overseas.”
