Speeches by Malthouse.

“No, it is not.”

“Sorry, can you just answer my question about how you extract that confidence? Is it human contact?”

“How do you extract that confidence, and from whom? A senior person comes out and tells you they are taking all of this terribly seriously? Without investigating the day-to-day practice how can you assure yourself, particularly in the light of a previous breach from which they had not learned the lessons?”

“I hope you would accept that an investigation is not just about learning lessons. There is also a deterrent effect from an investigation. Putting an organisation through a root and branch investigation is something it really does not want to do and will seek to avoid for the future.”

“Were there meetings above a certain rank? Did they wheel out, as it were, the Chief of the General Staff? Were high-ranking generals wheeled into the meeting to talk to your staff? I am referring to those kinds of human-level influential things with an organisation which wants to keep this very quiet, and went to court…”

“I share the Chair’s surprise that, given the severity and significant impact of this data breach, both on individuals and financially on the taxpayer, you have, broadly, said to us—forgive me for shorthanding it—that it was dealt with by a few unrecorded meetings and a handshake. “See ya, nothing to see here.” It seems…”

“Setting aside the fact that we find ourselves in a situation where conditions have been placed upon the cessation of the annihilation of an entire people and the strange delineation between hostages on one side and prisoners held in administrative detention on the other, we should all of course, as the Prime Minister s…”

“It does not have to be agreed. If it is the Department of Health and Social Care’s budget, it gets a say, even if you say, “We don’t think that’s enough.””

“Mr Lucas, you did not answer the second question about when you first told the Government.”

“There was an investment meeting in February where a number of CEOs were present, when the Prime Minister said that he would “sort the VPAG.”—I do not know whether the Merck global CEO was there. There has obviously been a period during which your expectation was that what the Prime Minister had promised was going to ha…”

“If you knew they were unhappy and the pricing mechanism was a problem, you have obviously had quite a lot of time since February to try to get it sorted. You accepted that the equation—the formula—had come up with an unexpectedly large amount. Who is stopping you from correcting it?”

“I understand all that, but off the back of Speke and now this, we have the Lilly freeze, AZ in Cambridge: it is looking like there is a contagion, and I guess we were hoping you would come with a, “Here’s what we’re going to do to sort it out.” We heard in the previous session that the timing of this is disappointment …”

“During those months of discussion, was it made clear to you that if there was not a resolution in a timeframe that was short enough, some investments might be under threat?”

“Who is making the decision about that offer? Is it you?”

“Minister, there will be one person who is making the decision, “This is the offer we’re going to give.””

“It just did not get anywhere.”

“Patrick, you seem remarkably relaxed about this announcement. I have to say, the reason we are having this emergency meeting is that we all think this seems to be part of a trend and pattern of decline of the industry. Given that your provenance is from the industry, I am surprised that you seem so relaxed about it.”

“I understand that; you have explained that already. Who said, “We are going to make a £1 billion offer?” Who said, “We’ll make an offer that is not going to be accepted?” Was it the Chancellor? Was it the Secretary of State for Health? I guess what we are trying to do is find the person who has the levers they can pull…”

“So in theory, we should have the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care in front of us at some point to talk about the pricing mechanism, why he is not making an offer that the industry can accept, and whether he is willing to see the industry decline.”

“Final two questions from me. Was there agreement between the Departments about the level of the offer or did the Department of Health and Social Care overrule your Department, Patrick? Secondly, what was the explanation for the offer not being voted on?”