Protective Clothing: Manufacturing Industries

(asked on 29th June 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he is taking steps with UK manufacturers to ensure that the country is self-sufficient in PPE production and supporting British enterprises; and if he will make a statement.


Answered by
Jo Churchill Portrait
Jo Churchill
Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
This question was answered on 17th July 2020

Lord Deighton is leading the Government effort to unleash the potential of British industry to manufacture personal protective equipment (PPE) for the health and social care sectors to create self-sufficient production of PPE for the United Kingdom. We are building up UK manufacturing with signed contracts to manufacture over 2 billion items of PPE through UK-based manufacturers, including facemasks, visors, gowns and aprons.

This includes Survitec, a survival technology company, who began producing gowns at the beginning of June; Bolle, who manufacture protective eyewear, will make 6.5 million visors over the course of the pandemic; Jaguar Land Rover are now manufacturing 14,000 visors/week for healthcare staff; Don & Low will be manufacturing 12 million metres squared of fabric for gowns over the next six months, with the first delivery expected later this month; Burberry is manufacturing non-surgical gowns at its factory in Castleford and sourcing masks through its supply chain. To date, the company has donated over 100,000 pieces of PPE to the National Health Service and healthcare charities.

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