Ministers should give public sector heroes a pay rise rather than lining chums' pockets
Instead of spending taxpayer billions lining their chum’s pockets, ministers should give public sector heroes a pay rise
GMB, the union for public sector workers, says the National Audit Office (NAO)’s report on the Government’s private contract cronyism is another shameful legacy of its mishandling of the covid crisis.
Today’s report says firms recommended by Tory MPs and Ministers were given priority when it came to dishing out £18 billion of contracts.
The auditors found that suppliers with links to politicians were ten times more likely to be awarded contracts than those who applied – while and not enough was done to identify conflicts of interests.
Rehana Azam, GMB National Secretary, said:
“Throughout this pandemic, GMB has called for openness and transparency on how Government contracts are awarded. More importantly, we’ve called for in-house options to be the preferred providers of services.
“But as this report shows, Tory cronyism is alive and well across the heart of Government.
"To this lot it’s obviously who you know not what you know that counts.
“Privatising our key workers access to PPE while handing these contracts to their mates, and then trying to hide the admin from the public is all part of this Government’s shameful legacy of how it handled of the Covid-19 pandemic.”
“Instead of spending taxpayer billions lining the pockets of Tory chums – Ministers should do the decent thing and give our frontline public sector heroes a decent pay rise.”
