CALLS have been made for an investigation into a coronavirus contract issued to a company that retains Winchester’s MP as an adviser.

In February Steve Brine took part in a video conference with Sigma Pharmaceuticals and Nadhim Zahawi, the vaccines minister at the time. Its declared purpose was to discuss “BAME [Black, Asian and minority ethnic] challenges to vaccine rollout”, according to government documents. In April the company won a £100,000 government contract to deliver lateral-flow tests to pharmacies.

Mr Brine was paid £20,000 a year for up to eight hours’ work a month for Sigma as a “strategic adviser”.

Now, Angela Rayner, deputy leader of the Labour Party, has asked Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, and Chris Wormald, the permanent secretary at the Department of Health and Social Care, if they would be “opening an investigation into this matter to get to the bottom of what happened and any wrongdoing that has occurred”, The Times has reported.

Mr Brine described the conference as a webinar that “gave the vaccine minister the chance to speak to and thank hundreds of pharmacists”.

He added that he was not a lobbyist and said he had no role in the award of the contract.

The MP also said that the event was broadcasted on YouTube and has remained online ever since it went out.

The Times reported that Bharat Shah, the founder of Sigma, also said Mr Brine was an adviser and not a lobbyist. He said Mr Brine “was not involved with or had any knowledge of” the lateral flow test contract.

Winchester’s Liberal Democrats have now called for the MP to “put local residents first”.

Lib Dem councillor Paula Ferguson said: “This raises a whole bunch of questions. When there are so many health issues locally - whether it’s about the future of our hospital or how to tackle the pandemic - we need an MP who’s unambiguously putting local residents first. I can’t see how Steve Brine can work for local people and work for private health companies at the same time: he needs to decide which it is.”