RE: Mystery over who approved £126m vaccine investment - Very Significant IMO26 Jun 2020 10:50
continued (Part 2)....
"Imperial College London and University of Oxford did not reply to a request for comment on the matter. But Robin Shattock, a professor at Imperial who leads its vaccine project, told The Times in April that “someone from Whitehall got in touch” and then health secretary Matt Han**** told him over the phone he “had the budget on his table and asked, ‘Should I sign this?’”
The mystery over exactly who approved the award of such large sums has been deepened by Dominic Cummings, the Prime Minister’s chief aide, using vaccine funding as one of the reasons he needed to travel from Durham back to London, a journey that potentially broke lockdown rules.
A Cabinet Office spokesperson said Cummings was not speaking on behalf of the government and directed questions on funding decision to BEIS and Department of Health and Social Care.
UKRI also confirmed that the money did not go through them, adding that “responsibility for the additional funding lies with DHSC [the Department of Health and Social Care] and BEIS” and that the questions on this funding would be best directed to those two departments.
DHSC said that “vaccine funding is led by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy” and declined to comment further while BEIS declined to comment at all on how the funding came about and was approved, and whether there was any peer review involved.
Philip Duffy, chief scientific adviser to the treasury, told a House of Commons Science and Technology committee meeting on 5 June that the Treasury has a team dedicated to fast-tracking approval on Covid-19 vaccine investment that reports to him, but added that “we have not waived our normal approval processes”.
Asked about the approval process for the funding, the treasury directed questions on the matter to BEIS.
One thing that does appear clear is that the government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies—headed by Chief Scientific Adviser, Patrick Vallance—did not recommend the funding. A spokesperson for Vallance’s Government Office for Science said “Sage did not discuss and they don’t advise on funding decisions”. They also referred further questions to BEIS.
Research Professional News understands that the Vaccine Taskforce, announced on 17 April and whose chair was announced on 18 May, will assess future vaccine proposals, together with BEIS’s board of experts, and will decide whether or not to commit funds based on scientific recommendation.
The Expert Advisory Board that advises the Vaccine Taskforce announced by BEIS alongside the second batch of funding on 17 May is chaired by the chief scientist Vallance, and includes leads of both of the funded projects, Robin Shattock, a professor at Imperial, and Sarah Gilbert of the University of Oxford.
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