Test and Trace failures

Despite its name, NHS Test and Trace is not an NHS service, but a largely outsourced programme run by a variety of private companies. Unions have been heavily critical of the privatised system. Last year, the GMB general union called on its boss, Conservative peer Baroness Dido Harding, to resign following “blunder after blunder” under her leadership. It demanded the programme “be taken into public hands and led by experts and local authorities, not party-political cronies”.

The GMB’s call followed protest action by NHS campaigners to highlight outsourcing giant Serco’s continuing failure to hit the targets set by the government’s SAGE scientific advisors for contracts traced. In October, the We Own It campaign against privatisation said local government and public health protection teams were doing contact tracing work most effectively. The failing privatised national system was reported to be costing the taxpayer £900 per person contacted.  

In addition, the lack of financial support is a massive barrier to preventing infection because many low-paid workers cannot afford to take time off work to self-isolate (see pages 29-30).