London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Wednesday, Oct 08, 2025

Owen Paterson's private messages about Randox testing released

Owen Paterson's private messages about Randox testing released

Former MP Owen Paterson discussed how a firm he worked for as a paid consultant could offer Covid-19 tests in messages with health ministers, documents show.

The messages from 2020 refer to health firm Randox, which was later awarded lucrative contracts to supply tests.

Labour requested the messages as scrutiny intensified over Mr Paterson's job with Randox.

He quit as an MP last year after the parliamentary standards commissioner found he broke lobbying rules.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson's government attempted to block his suspension by overhauling the standards system for MPs, but was forced to reverse its decision after a furious backlash.

A former environment secretary, Mr Paterson had been earning almost £100,000 a year as a paid consultant for Randox alongside his duties as an MP for North Shropshire.

In October last year, the parliamentary watchdog found Mr Paterson had misused his position as an MP to benefit Randox and another firm he worked for.

MPs are allowed to have second jobs - but their code of conduct says they must avoid conflict between personal and public interests.

In his resignation letter, Mr Paterson said: "I maintain that I am totally innocent of what I have been accused of and I acted at all times in the interests of public health and safety."

Since the start of the pandemic, Randox has been awarded £619.7m in government contracts without a competitive bidding process.

Randox has repeatedly said Mr Paterson "played no role in securing any Randox contract" with the government.

But the messages, released on Friday, cast light on what Mr Paterson told the government about the services Randox could possibly offer in developing Covid tests.

The government said the messages showed "no evidence" of procurement rule breaches.

A spokesman for the then Health Secretary Matt Hancock also said the documents showed he did nothing wrong, adding: "Matt cannot control who contacts him, but he followed protocol and Owen Paterson's lobbying was flagged to officials."

And a spokesperson for Randox said: "It is clear from these papers that Randox contracts were awarded in full compliance with government procedures and protocols in place at a time of the emerging pandemic."

But Labour insisted they revealed "a catastrophic failure of governance".

The party's deputy leader Angela Rayner said the documents revealed a "government that is awash with sleaze from the prime minister down, and simply incapable of governing in the public interest."

Mr Paterson is yet to comment on the messages.

What do the messages say?


The first set of messages were sent between Mr Paterson and Mr Hancock are exchanged on 26 January 2020, at the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

In the first message, Mr Paterson passed on the email of Randox owner, Peter Fitzgerald, and said the firm could develop a Covid test within three weeks if it received 10 positive samples of the virus.

Mr Hancock assured the MP he would "look into it" and went on to email Mr Fitzgerald.

In that email, sent on the same day, Mr Hancock asked for "more detail" about the "diagnostic test" so "we can look into it".

Former Health Secretary Matt Hancock emailed the owner of Randox in January 2020, the document shows


Then, on 25 February 2020, Mr Paterson messaged the minister saying it had been 19 days since Public Health England had contacted Randox and while the company's test had "worked perfectly" there had been no more communication.

"PHE's attitude looks incomprehensible given current developments and time pressures," Mr Paterson wrote in the message.

Mr Hancock then appeared to forward Mr Paterson's concerns to officials, writing: "If we are treating other companies like this we are failing".

A few days later, on 30 March 2020, Randox was awarded a £133m contract to produce coronavirus testing kits. Later correspondence from 25 September 2020 shows plans to renew Randox's services in a contract worth £346.5m.

In an email on that date, senior civil servant Alex Chisholm expressed disappointment that a "competitive" process had not been established for such contracts.

Another email sent on that date warned that "we are paying dramatically over the odds" for the tests provided by Randox.

The email was signed off by the office of Lord Agnew, a former minster who dramatically resigned last month over the government's handling of fraudulent Covid business loans.

Randox is an international health and toxicology company headquartered in the UK


A number of heavily redacted WhatsApp messages with names censored are also included in the documents.

One, from the 22 October 2020, says "the Guardian yesterday yet again ran the story that you only gave Randox the testing contract because I am a paid consultant".

The person, who is not named, asked for help to "kill this once and for all as I know absolutely nothing about the contract".

In a statement, the Department of Health and Social Care told the BBC the government "took every possible step to build the largest diagnostic industry in UK history rapidly and from scratch".

"Building the scale of testing needed at an unprecedented speed required extensive collaboration with businesses, universities, and others, to get the right skills, equipment and logistics in place as quickly as possible.

"There are robust rules and processes in place to ensure that conflicts of interest do not occur and all contracts are awarded in line with procurement regulations and transparency guidelines. Decisions on whether to award contracts are taken by officials and approved by ministers.

"The documents given to the House show no evidence of any breach of these principles."

More on Owen Paterson lobbying row:


Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
×