A total of 150 questions have been put to Boris Johnson by the UK inquiry into the nation’s pandemic response, which is being chaired by Heather Hallett. These queries, intended to elicit exact details of how the government tried to tackle the Covid-19 epidemic, reveal for the first time just how broad the inquiry will be. But Johnson is not the only person likely to be feeling uneasy about the direction the inquiry is heading – they hint at problems ahead for Rishi Sunak too.
Why did you not attend any Cobra meetings in relation to Covid-19 prior to 2 March 2020, given the seriousness of the emergency? This is one of the most important and potentially embarrassing questions facing Boris Johnson. While the rest of the world had become increasingly fretful and alarmed in March about the spread of Sars-CoV-2, the viral agent responsible for Covid-19, Johnson had by this time failed to attend a series of Cobra meetings that had been held to discuss the swelling pandemic. His absence has been criticised heavily. His excuses for failing to attend will be studied carefully. What discussions did you have with the then chancellor about the Eat Out to Help Out scheme prior to its implementation in August 2020? In contrast to the previous question, this query is likely to cause far more discomfort for Rishi Sunak. The Eat Out to Help Out scheme cost a mighty £850m and was subsequently linked to a jump in Covid cases that autumn. No epidemiologist appears to have been consulted in the scheme’s creation, however. What was your understanding as to whether individuals being discharged from hospital into care homes would first be tested for Covid-19? Patients with Covid-19 were routinely discharged from hospital to clear beds for already infected patients at the start of the pandemic. However, this was done without them first being tested for Covid-19. This failure brought the coronavirus into care homes for the first time. Staff struggled to get hold of coronavirus tests for vulnerable residents or staff and care homes suffered a devastating rise in deaths during the disease’s first wave in the UK. In or around autumn 2020, did you state that you would rather “let the bodies pile high” than order another lockdown, or words to that effect? This questions cuts to the dark days in September 2020 when case numbers had begun to rise significantly after the summer and in the wake of the Eat Out to Help Out scheme. Scientists at Sage have made it clear that they wanted a brief mini-lockdown to halt this increase but the government resisted, only to introduce a far stricter regime after cases and deaths rose to alarming levels. Why did you attend a personal/social meeting on the evening of 19 March, after you had called on the UK on 16 March to stop all non-essential contact with others? This question relates to Johnson’s meeting with Evening Standard proprietor Evgeny Lebedev on 19 March, shortly before the tycoon was nominated for a peerage. Although the Partygate scandal gets few other mentions in questions from Baroness Hallett, this one indicates the issue is still likely to become an issue for Johnson. Did you say on or around 22 September 2020 that you felt that Sage had “manipulated” you into imposing the first lockdown? The issue of Johnson and Sunak’s use of scientific advice from the government Sage advisory committee is a controversial one. Its members have said they were never asked to comment on proposed strategy but were merely asked specific questions about particular issues. The government’s claim that it always followed the science over Covid is disputed, in other words.