Leamington MP calls for Parliamentary debate off of the back of "money wasted" on Covid 'mega lab'

The Rosalind Franklin laboratory, named after the pioneering British chemist, in the former Wolseley buildings off Tachbrook Road and Queensway, opened in June 2021 and was the largest testing facility of its kind in the UK for a time.

But it closed in January of 2023.

In the November of that year, Mr Western expressed his anger after the lease for the site had been put up for sale after the operation cost tax payers £455 million.

Speaking in Parliament yesterday (Thursday June 12), Mr Western said: “We were promised the facility would be retained after the pandemic for more general testing.

"Sadly it was unceremoniously put up for sale on Rightmove a couple of years ago.

"Can I ask the Leader of the House if we can have a debate into the provision of diagnostic testing more generally in this country.”

Leader of the House Lucy Powell MP replied to Mr Western saying: “I’m sorry to hear that this testing facility in your constituency closed under the previous Government despite their previous commitments to it.

"He [Mr Western] will be aware that we will soon be setting out the ten year NHS strategy where these kind of questions, I’m sure, he will want to put to the Secretary of State.”

Mr Western posted about the issue on his Facebook page today.

He said: “Many will remember the last Government setting up the Rosalind Franklin Laboratory – aka ‘mega lab’ in 2-021 and all the promises that came with it.

“This was the then Government’s press release at the time - ‘it represents an investment in our scientific capabilities for the future. The development of the laboratory will help establish a flexible pandemic response infrastructure that can respond to surges in demand’.

“When I repeatedly challenged the long-term sense of the £600 million project about the same as 30 new primary schools I was told that, post pandemic, it would morph into a permanent diagnostics centre.

“And they said there would be 2,000 jobs.

“What we see today is that it has long ceased operating and in 2023 it appeared on Rightmove.

"You couldn’t make it up.

“This is just one of the examples of the serious waste we saw during the pandemic.

"Whether it be the millions wasted on unusable PPE or this laboratory closer to home, they threw our money around like it was nothing.

"We were in a crisis, but our money still deserved to be treated with respect.

“This laboratory should have given our communities hundreds of jobs for years to come but it has just given us an empty laboratory filled with only empty promises.

“I raised this case in Parliament yesterday and will be writing to the Secretary of State for Health to understand why the last Government wasted so much money and what facilities and capacity would be available in the event of a future pandemic impact on our community.”