The Covid Inquiry.

You're not actually expecting any material change / MP's/Boris being held to account/ prosecutions from PPE corruption or shovelling tractor loads of public cash to their mates are you?   

Senior people communicated via Whatsapp but put ‘disappearing messages’ function on, apparently for no apparent reason that they can recall.

The lead up and initial stages of covid should be covered though, right? WhatsApp only released the feature in November 2020, Right?

‘Party Marty’ Martin Reynolds and it would appear that:

He couldn't remember why, at the time Reynolds was Johnson's PPS, Johnson did not chair the Cobra meeting after there was two confirmed deaths of Covid in January...

The shirking of the responsibility for not preparing for this is going to go down in history as  defining moment in modern politics I think, like Chamberlains waving of a blank piece of paper, or Grey's "Lights going out all over Europe" on the eve of WW1

Reynolds is utterly unconvincing; in fact, I would describe him as pathetic
It's scary to think that he and others like him have been helping to run the country.
He's unable to recall why he turned on the what's app disappearing message function because of the elapsed time - but seems to have very good recall of other activities from the same time.
Requested by the lead counsel to 'talk clearly' - in other words, stop using civil service bullshit aka management speak and tell the truth.
In his own words -
'I'm not someone who was giving strong advice'
'...did not proactively seek out' scientific material about infection rates
'I had an overview of everything everyone was doing and we could pick up things if the ball was being dropped, but it was an information flow between the system and the prime minister'
'The nature of my role is to manage the organisation of the operation around the prime minister to make sure he is getting a good service, is being updated, consulted and asked for decisions'.

Feeble.

I'm all for transparency, but I'm not sure what this enquiry is going to acheive. It'll take ages, there'll be a massive media froth when it's eventually released and it's full of damning criticism and then......nothing will happen.

You’re not actually expecting any material change / MP’s/Boris being held to account

It does seem rather unlikely.
As a rule the only time a public inquiry will put the boot in is either when its suitably far in the past not to matter or something the opposition party is responsible for.
Otherwise its time to write the inquiry terms of reference carefully to minimise damage.

The only chance is the likes of cummings seeking revenge.

This public enquiry isn't intended to put the boot into anyone, directly.

It's role is to identify lessons to learn and help plan for the next pandemic.

The main lesson seeming to be "don't have the Tories in charge"

nothing will happen.

Now hang on...All those other really expensive inquiries that have happened before Like Chilcott, Levenson, Grenfell, Hillsborough have all lead to ground breaking legislation and the guilty thrown into goal, and they are not at all about hoping that "just taking about it, and sometimes saying sorry" is enough for everyone

It's still surreal to think that we went through that whole nightmare during 2020/21, it's madness to think how the entire planet went to pot in the space of a few weeks, just think back to the toilet roll fiasco, standing in car park queues 2m apart to get some shopping, mask wearing / mask shaming, folk grassing up their neighbours for having more than 6 folk and so on 🤣

Now hang on…All those other really expensive inquiries that have happened before Like Chilcott, Levenson, Grenfell, Hillsborough have all lead to ground breaking legislation and the guilty thrown into goal, and they are not at all about hoping that “just taking about it, and sometimes saying sorry” is enough for everyone

Genuinely, I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic or not.

@frankconway

‘I’m not someone who was giving strong advice’

The 2019 election and aftermath was all about stuffing parliament and government with Brexit yes men, so not at all surprising.

hey are not at all about hoping that “just taking about it, and sometimes saying sorry” is enough for everyone

Whoa, hold on, there will also be 'lessons to be learned' and promises that substantial change has already been made in the many years that have passed by the time the report comes out.

At this point im not interested in the outcome of this inquiry. I am however interested in any way in which the lives of those who lied, cheated and lined their pockets with cash can be put in jail. Preferably an under funded over crowded one.

TBH given the time that has elapsed the government has had ample opportunity to get its story right so I’m not expecting much.  I think it’s also the case that the UK government is hardly alone on the inadequacy of its response to Covid. I doubt the Scottish government is going to come out of  this very well either. Lots of WhatsApp messages seem to have disappeared North of the border as well.

I can see how the WhatsApp thing came about. As a civil servant it's made clear that messaging apps of any types including email/Teams/Slack etc are not the place to store or record business decisions. Issues around GDPR and FOI mean that business information needs to be recorded and stored in systems that are robust and comply with data and information policies.
Obvs Covid wasn't business as usual, but I can understand why civil servants and advisors chose not to keep messages in those apps. Of course whether they recorded the right stuff in the systems they were meant to is another question.

Genuinely, I’m not sure if you’re being sarcastic or not.

Huh, that feels somehow weirdly like a compliment. I was going for sarcasm 

Issues around GDPR and FOI mean that business information needs to be recorded and stored in systems that are robust and comply with data and information policies.

Records are supposed to be kept. If WhatsApp wasn't considered secure enough for that, then they shouldn't have used it. Relying on manual copying of (selected no doubt) messages from one system to another will only mean one thing... key information will be lost and "looking back" to learn lessons for the future running of the country will be obstructed.

The lead up and initial stages of covid should be covered though, right?

For that one must defer to the “North Sea Defence”. 

Of course whether they recorded the right stuff in the systems they were meant to is another question.

Lets hazard a guess, shall we?

Outcome - Some scientists were found to be out of line, and will be punished accordingly.

Bribery and corruption section is going to be interesting. Who are they going to sacrifice 😕

TBH given the time that has elapsed the government has had ample opportunity to get its story right so I’m not expecting much

This is the Johnson government we are talking about so a couple of flaws with this.
Firstly most of them seem to hate each other now so couldnt get together to get the story right.
Secondly they are a bunch of backstabbers who will be busy portraying themselves as a hero fighting against all the incompetents.
Thirdly unless it includes spaffing public money up the wall they generally cant be arsed with boring details like getting a story straight.

Records are supposed to be kept.

Of course whether they recorded the right stuff in the systems they were meant to is another question.

The issue shouldn't be about disappearing messages, it should be about having a record of what was done and why. Subtle but significant differences.

Huh, that feels somehow weirdly like a compliment. I was going for sarcasm

Good 🙂

(Although, TBF, the Hillsborough was probably worthwhile in terms of outcome)

Nothing more than a PR / publicity stunt. To think its anything more is just laughable and beyond naïve.

Oh look, troll who has history for pointless posts.

We had the worst government in modern history at a time when we needed the best.

Even a functioning Tory Party (pre UKIP malignancy) would have handled things far better than the actuality.

Instead we had a government packed with the "loyal to the cause/Leader" types, led by a compulsive liar and self promoter, at war with it's own advisers and civil service.

This enquiry *is* important, ask the relatives of those that died needlessly. Add into that the likelihood that we will see another pandemic in within our life times which could be far worse.

Surely no-one believes that after 200k died in the UK we all watched our Trainwreck of a response to it all on the news every night that we should just move on and brush it under the carpet? That's just incredible to me.

It should ideally be run alongside a simultaneous inquiry as to why the general public are so unbelievably thick.

Yes, we had an utterly abysmal Government, woefully unprepared in spite of a recent exercise in pandemic preparedness which had warned of exactly that.

But it was compounded by the conspiracy theorists, media and a host of opinion pieces written by morons to the extent that a significant percentage of the general public thought it was a scam, a hoax, nothing to worry about etc.

Willing to bet that if it had been something like Ebola, they'd have been a lot more concerned about mask wearing and vaccines.

its reassuring that the scientists recognised that those in charge were absolute clowns

its just unfortunate that si much of the electorate refuse to see that

as for the conspiracy theorists, antivaxers and media idiots like julia Hartley brewer, Lawrence fox, erc who promted that crap

they should be in court

It should ideally be run alongside a simultaneous inquiry as to why the general public are so unbelievably thick

Decades of education policy deliberately avoiding teaching critical thinking....

Just imagine how well we’re dealing with the climate crisis when we butcher pandemic response.

i remember at the time we had to keep lots of evidence of how we did stuff and why we made those decisions ata local level 

First time we have had to deal with a pandemic. Some mistakes were made some stuff was done really well from central government down to individual provider

I remember very clearly at the time the general public wanted to ignore the science (remember all the big hitter  mtb YouTubers breaking the rules etc )

So long as we learn we can move forward. Finger pointing and a witch hunt don’t help learning 

Finger pointing and a witch hunt don’t help learning

not to rehash the whole Lucy Letby thread, but I struggle to square that off. Yes, it was a complex and fast moving situation and mistakes will have been made, from which we should learn and use that to do better in future.

But 'no blame' or 'no witch hunt' - if the mistakes are seriously idiotic / negligent then the leaders making them have to be accountable, that's what accountability is. And if they're beyond negligent and actually driven by other purposes (IDK but let's say the PPE is actually proven to be bent) then we can't allow people to just avoid repercussions by claiming it was a difficult situation and they were doing their best.

Theother fair comment!

At the time Boris ended up in hospital I do remember thinking how does this man sticking to the rules end up nearly dying from COVID

Maybe he’s learnt from the error of his ways from that… maybe

What I’m not sure is s would any other leadership have been any better, especially an opposition that can’t come up with any plan (in advance) on how they would govern a country let alone react to a pandemic

No fingerpointing, but Rishi Sunak really is a sociopath, isn't he? 🙂

It's no surprise to find that he's a principle source of the 'Let 'em die' sentiment. He must be praying that the true impact of 'Eat out to Help Out' isn't apparent in the figures.

I'm sure all the main figures will be long gone by the point it's time for Hancock to get blamed for everything, but I'm interested to see if the inquiry report can get its teeth into what went wrong around the timing of lockdowns. As an outside observer it seemed that we went too late on the first two lockdowns, and that meant longer/harder lockdowns and more deaths.

Weak/wrong science advice, a distracted, anti-science government, or a bit of both? It does seem as if Johnson was surrounded by braying idiots like Shapps and Williamson who were urging a 'let it rip' policy.

The SNP are also severely app-challenged it seems... https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-67254855

Scottish Covid Inquiry starts soon

You’re not actually expecting any material change / MP’s/Boris being held to account/ prosecutions from PPE corruption or shovelling tractor loads of public cash to their mates are you? 

First role of taking over a new team/business/govt is to perform an 'audit' and see what can be blamed on the previous 'administration', I expect nothing less from Starmer's Govt.

Incompetence needs exposing and corruption needs investigating and where appropriate folk need punishing (fined and, where relevant imprisoned).  Otherwise we'll never get trust back of our leaders "they're all at it".  Starmer has to make sure the boil is lanced.

At the time Boris ended up in hospital I do remember thinking how does this man sticking to the rules end up nearly dying from COVID

is this sarcasm?

because we now know he really wasn't sticking to the rules, in fact quite the opposite!

From today's Times, a couple of things that I thought stood out from some pretty incredible revelations yesterday with plenty more to come I'm sure.

FunkyDunc
Free Member
i remember at the time we had to keep lots of evidence of how we did stuff and why we made those decisions ata local level

First time we have had to deal with a pandemic. Some mistakes were made some stuff was done really well from central government down to individual provider

I remember very clearly at the time the general public wanted to ignore the science (remember all the big hitter mtb YouTubers breaking the rules etc )

So long as we learn we can move forward. Finger pointing and a witch hunt don’t help learning

At many individual and organisational levels there were some truly amazing people involved that I have no doubt saved many lives. That does need to be recognised. The fact much of that happened in spite of government failures makes it all the more important.

All that being said, look at the excerpt from the Times above. During the run up to the first lock down we had the person that was meant to be steering the ship AWOL. When he does bother to read emails and attend his (single?) Cobra meeting he is all over the show and lamenting the fact that the measures put in place were only to save people that were soon to die anyway.

This isn't going after Boris, he is just the most visible part of a government that was in total disarray in large part due to its own making.

No one is going to see the inside of a jail over this (I'm not even protesting that they should) but there were totally avoidable mistakes that have to acknowledged otherwise governments of the future of any flavour will just act with utter impunity.

We aren't talking about a failure that just cost money, it played a part in the deaths of 200k people. Some of those people should still be alive. We'll never know for sure but we could be talking about tens of thousands by some estimates. That's a tragedy and an incredible failure that needs to be acknowledged.

We owe them and their families the truth and we owe future generations the same.

At the time Boris ended up in hospital I do remember thinking how does this man sticking to the rules end up nearly dying from COVID

What kimbers said plus, do you really believe he almost ended up dying from Covid? Compared to practically everyone else who got COVID, Johnson and Hancock made miraculously full and rapid recoveries.

It was nothing more than a staged managed publicity stunt.

At the time Boris ended up in hospital I do remember thinking how does this man sticking to the rules end up nearly dying from COVID

There was some discussion further down the line as to exactly how "ill" he really was - can't remember the details but I'm sure it was later claimed that it had been little more than a ruse to get out of some awkward situation or other and that it was effectively a medium term equivalent of hiding in a fridge...

I think Downing Street played it the other way - yes he's fine, all is well, the PM does have Covid but only mild - while actually it was more serious than they were admitting.

I think it tells you everything you need to know about the quality of the political leadership in place at the time, to just look at what the two principle players are doing now.

The former PM is about to start hosting a programme spouting reactionary drivel on GeeBeebies and the former Health secretary is desperately grubbing around to appear on any low rent reality TV show that will have him.

We need to know the detail of how desperately ill-equipped these pair of morons were for the responsibility placed on them, in the vain, probably desperate hope that maybe we won't find ourselves with such clueless charlatans in place in future.

And on that note, I can't see Rishi's standing improving as detail starts to come out about his involvement

I doubt Cummings will spare his vitriol for him any more than he'll spare Johnson. Its going to be fascinating hearing what he's got to say. I expect Boris is already hiding in a fridge in anticipation

If the Laura Kuenssberg, State of Chaos doc is to be believed (and I don't doubt it is) Boris had essentially delegated the job of PM to Cummings as he simply couldn't be arsed with it

and the former Health secretary is desperately grubbing around to appear on any low rent reality TV show that will have him.

I only saw this because there's a clip doing the rounds on Twitter now of him in the interrogation phase of Celebrity SAS being called a weasel-faced ****.

I'm now wondering if the interrogator woman is available for the whole Covid inquiry!

then the leaders making them have to be accountable, that’s what accountability is.

Sure is, but as far as this group of people are concerned the point of the exercise is to make sure that "some-one else" gets the blame. They're not interested in what went wrong and how to improve it, all they want from it is to make sure they're not the one left standing when the music stops, so everything they say and do is geared towards that outcome. 

If the Laura Kuenssberg, State of Chaos doc is to be believed (and I don’t doubt it is) Boris had essentially delegated the job of PM to Cummings as he simply couldn’t be arsed with it

Johnson at 10 by Anthony Seldon  is worth a read. Although, if you're like me you'll find you have to put it down and go for a walk now and again to stop yourself plotting bloody murder. 

I hate to say it but I think I might have to reaprise my view of Dominic Cummings. According to Lee Cains testimony (another bloody over-promoted journalist!), 'Dom' was the only one 'kicking the tyres'

In other words he was the only person asking the question about what the plan for a pandemic actually was. He described what he found in the cabinet office as 'terrifyingly shit'

Nobody knew who it was who was actually responsible for doing anything and nobody seemed to care. Its the same word that keeps on cropping up again and again and again when describing what was going on in number 10 under Johnson ...

Chaos!

How is it that these people are allowed to use Whatsapp etc for official business anyway?

All 'business' comms should be via their official secure email system and an official secure messaging system.

They are not being held to anywhere near the level of scrutiny they should be.

I only saw this because there’s a clip doing the rounds on Twitter now of him in the interrogation phase of Celebrity SAS being called a weasel-faced ****.

Whether is his combo of unfortunately having the looks and personality of someone you'd want to punch, or the reality of what he did is true, thats the only thing that comes from his time in charge. Meanwhile he continues to pedal the "I did my best in challenging circumstances and acted on the Woman I fell in love with, and haven't profited from the pandemic" line which makes me feel sick. I haven't see that episode yet, but unfortunately he fared well through other aspects of the course which up until the episode before he has allowed him to verbalise his " resilient and can do" abilities.

Like all the others he goes down as a immoral liar in my book and it'd take a miracle for me to change my mind.

* me! I've heard it all now

Asked if the prime minister was up to the job, his answer was...

"I think it was the wrong crisis for this Prime Ministers skillset"

What *ing skillset would that be then?

According to Lee Cains

Yeah, don't forget that he is a creature of Cummings though. And if it was Cummings in charge, then we can lay at his feet: The woeful centralised  Track and Trace, constantly changing the strategy, moving very sick patients back into care homes, and the inconstancy of communications. 

Which just leaves, prioritising money over people, the terrible and unforgivable delay, and the lack of preparedness. 

What ****ing skillset would that be then?

Winning votes.