AstraZeneca accused of rowing back on pledges in vaccine hub row

AstraZeneca declined to comment.On Friday AstraZeneca said: “Several factors have influenced this decision, including the timing and reduction of the final offer compared to the previous government’s proposal.”The Times revealed last month that the chair of AstraZeneca wrote to the business secretary to warn of delays to the project because the level of support had not been agreed. This decision effectively reduced the level of R&D set aside for the UK and therefore altered how much money ministers could offer in grants to the company, it is claimed. After scrutiny by Treasury officials it was considered that the amount of grant money that AstraZeneca was lobbying for did not represent value for money for the taxpayer.The Liverpool site was intended to make vaccines for future pandemics and outbreaks of the flu. The site will continue to manufacture flu jabs.

In November AstraZeneca, Britain’s largest company with a market capitalisation of £176 billion, announced a planned .5 billion of R&D investment in the US. It is also investing .5 billion in manufacturing in Singapore and 0 million in Canada.It is understood that the investment could now be moved to the US or Europe. The company, which employs about 10,000 people in the UK, also saw its national insurance bill increase significantly after the chancellor’s tax-raising budget.The row between ministers and Britain’s largest public company escalated this weekend after Treasury insiders claimed that AstraZeneca had decided to spend a greater proportion of its research and development (R&D) fund abroad than previously thought.AstraZeneca had signed a deal with the previous chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, and had secured financial support from the government to contribute to the project. However, last summer ministers tried to reduce the amount of support from £90 million to £40 million.Treasury officials claimed that they worked at pace to conduct the proper due diligence and refine an offer for AstraZeneca to consider.

Ministers scaled back financial support for AstraZeneca to build a vaccine hub in Liverpool because the drugs giant decided to divert investment overseas that had previously been ear-marked for the UK, it is understood.What followed was months of wrangling between the government and AstraZeneca over the level of its R&D spend at the site. Sources close to AstraZeneca claimed that it had tried to engage with the government repeatedly but that ministers’ insistence on reducing the amount of support for the project made it uncompetitive internationally.On Friday, the FTSE 100 company announced that it would be scrapping plans to build a £450 million vaccine manufacturing plant in Speke after months of disagreement over the amount of money that the government would contribute to the project. The announcement was a blow to ministers at a time when they are trying to persuade companies to invest in the UK and power economic growth.