Back in April, the Government appointed ex Goldman Sachs banker Lord Deighton as "PPE Tsar". https://www.gov.uk/government/news/olympics-chief-brought-in-to-boost-ppe-production">https://www.gov.uk/governmen...
Earlier this month, Government stated that on 20 April it had awarded a £300,000 contract, without any tendering process, to "Chanzo" ( https://ted.europa.eu/udl?uri=TED:NOTICE:473244-2020:TEXT:EN:HTML&src=0).">https://ted.europa.eu/udl...
In fact the contract was not awarded until 25 August (although sent under cover of a letter dated 20 August - figure that one out!) but related to services delivered from April ( #0O000000rwim/a/4J000000kDim/brJSVz423zVcKB2NcGBUGTdyzwObgwnCNUF3HzQnOjQ">https://atamis-1928.cloudforce.com/sfc/p/ #0O000000rwim/a/4J000000kDim/brJSVz423zVcKB2NcGBUGTdyzwObgwnCNUF3HzQnOjQ).">https://atamis-1928.cloudforce.com/sfc/p/...
The services to be delivered (for £300,000) were (1) a & #39;Chief of Staff& #39; (a glorified Executive Assistant) for six months; (2) helping recruit 2 full time temporary HR roles for six months; and one for three months; and (3) HR advice pending appointment of those roles.
You might think roles (2) and (3) are jobs a Chief of Staff could do. And you might wonder whether £300k was value for money for a six month Chief of Staff role. Even if it meant someone else recruiting 2-3 temporary staff. Especially if the contract was awarded without tender.
If you did have those concerns they would hardly be alleviated by the knowledge that Chanzo& #39;s website carried a glowing recommendation from, yep, Lord Deighton.
Why, you might even conclude they were channelling generous public contracts to pals!
Why, you might even conclude they were channelling generous public contracts to pals!