Sixth report from the Select Committee on Estimates : together with the minutes of evidence taken before sub-committee D and appendices, session 1956-1957: Running costs of hospitals.

  • Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. Select Committee on Estimates
Date:
[1957]
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sixth report from the Select Committee on Estimates : together with the minutes of evidence taken before sub-committee D and appendices, session 1956-1957: Running costs of hospitals. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    § February, 1957.] [Continued. 261. Could you assure the Committee that the maximum possible is purchased centrally? No. I should not have thought it is the maximum possible. There are other things which possibly could be tackled. 262. With resultant savings? resultant savings. With Mrs. Hill. 263. When the Ministry makes a con- tract is it always the same price which will be available to all Management Committees for a given article, or does it sometimes happen that there might be one or two different prices at which a Management Committee may eventually have to take their goods even though on Ministry contract? Practically always there is one price. There have been, I think, one or two cases where it has been necessary to split a contract between two suppliers at different prices. 264. I should have thought there were more? There are very few, actually. 265. Does the Ministry have special arrangements with some contractors whereby those goods they purchase from the contract are free of purchase tax? No, there is no special arrangement. It is normal in government contracting that the government contract does not attract purchase tax. In other words, the goods purchased under government con- tract are not subject to purchase tax. Chairman. 266. The Management Committees or Regional Boards are not debited with the purchase tax?——_No. Mrs. Hill. 267. Would the witness think that that does cut out, possibly, other suppliers where Management Committees go to tender for their goods, that it places other firms in a very difficult position, and that their price might even be lower than the Ministry price if the purchase tax did not have to be added to it? Yes, I think that follows, that if a Management Com- mittee purchases independently the goods which are already available under a cen- tral contract and under that contract the price does not include the purchase tax, then as the Management Committee would have to pay the purchase tax on the goods it buys completely indepen- dently there will be a difference of price. Chairman. 268. That is another argument in fav- our of central purchase? If you look at it in that light, yes. Take, for example, the purchase tax on hospital mattresses. That purchase tax is not paid under the government contract for the supply of mattresses to hospitals, but if a Manage- ment Committee bought the same mat- tress independently not under the Minis- ter’s arrangements it would have to pay the purchase tax on that mattress. 269. Do Hospital Management Com- mittees do that very much? Very little. 270. I think you said you did not think the maximum possible was done by central purchasing. Does that imply you think there are economies which can be made but which have not yet ‘been made? ‘The Select Committee on Estimates last year considering the Stationery Office Estimates recom- mended, for example, that we should consider making central arrangements through the Stationery Office for the supply of books to hospitals. That is now being investigated. 271. I was going a lot further than that, because that is not a very great sum, is it? We do not know. 272. Do you feel there is room for further central contracting? In some ways, yes. There could be room, par- ticularly, I think, in the bedding and linen field. 273. What has prevented it happening up to now? Nothing really, except that most hospitals have already made very good arrangements themselves, and there is very little additional advantage now in making—— 274. You do not think there is a great deal of room for savings in that direc- tion? There may be some. It is diffi- cult to say how much until it is investigated. Mr. Robinson. 275. When you have made extensions you found you have met resistance in the first instance on the part of Regional
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