Unite union, with members including 100,000 NHS staff, are calling for greater transparency over how companies secure NHS work. In particular it wishes to understand better how ‘Virgin and other private healthcare companies have acquired such a plethora of NHS contracts’. Virgin alone has secured NHS contracts worth around £2bn, so MPs on the health and social care committee have been urged to investigate how a private provider can be awarded so much. Unite head of health said: ‘With the spectre of Carillion still haunting the public sector the select committee needs to urgently examine whether the NHS and taxpayer is getting value for money from Virgin Care accumulating so many health service contracts.” Read the GP website here for the full story. And read Spend Matters here and here for background information on Virgin’s health sector awards.