THE storage of personal protective equipment (PPE) is costing the taxpayer nearly half a million pounds a day, analysis by Labour showed today.

The government revealed in a written reply to Labour that storage of PPE related to Covid-19 is estimated to be a staggering £3.3 million a week.

Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner, who requested an estimate of the costs, said that this equates to £471,429 being spent every day on storing PPE.

Ms Rayner said struggling families would be “outraged” to learn how much is being “frittered away” on PPE storage costs.

Labour also claimed its analysis shows that government “waste” on PPE over the course of the pandemic would be enough to save each household in Britain more than £310.

The answer to Ms Rayner also revealed that £5.8 million of taxpayers’ money had been spent on PPE storage in China at the end of 2021.

Ms Rayner said: “While families are struggling to make their pay cheques last the month, they will be justly outraged to learn their hard-earned taxes are being frittered away to meet huge PPE storage costs on the other side of the world.

“The government flushing the public’s money down the drain with their wasteful cronyism adds insult to injury as they raise taxes on working people in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis.”

The MP for Ashton-under-Lyne had written to the government demanding publication of the “estimate of the costs of storage and warehousing for PPE from August 2021 to date.”

Health Minister Edward Argar said the latest information available for between September 1 2021 to November 30 2021 showed that the total cost for personal protective equipment storage “in the UK was £72.4 million and £5.8 million for storage in China.”

The weekly estimated cost was said to be 82 per cent less than in October 2020.