Watford MP Dean Russell has quizzed the PM’s former chief advisor in an explosive day of parliamentary evidence over the Government’s handling of the pandemic.
Today Dominic Cummings has given evidence before a joint parliamentary committee – the first of four sessions.
The former aide apologised to the public, saying that ministers, officials and advisers had fallen “disastrously short” of the standards they should expect in a crisis.
Watford MP Dean Russell was one of those to put questions to Mr Cummings.
The Tory MP pressed Mr Cummings on why he had failed to apologise for his notorious trip to north to Durham in March 2020 – which Mr Cummings had just claimed was a move taken due to security reasons.
Mr Cummings said his family had decided they needed to get away from his London home following death threats so ‘regardless of Covid rules’ they decided to move up north.
He added he was sorry for not telling the whole story at a press conference after the story broke, labelling it a ‘terrible, terrible mistake’.
Mr Russell took him to task, saying – with so many three-word slogans being used in Government Covid messaging (hands, face space etc) – the nation just wanted one three-word statement from Mr Cummings ‘I am sorry’.
“Everyone else was following the guidance, not going to funerals, not seeing their family, not hugging their children and the perception was you did this and did not have an apology to give,” he added.
When pressed on whether his notorious 'eye test' drive to Barnard Castle was a lie, Mr Cummings claimed if he were going to make up a lie to protect himself, he would have come up with something less 'crazy'.
Earlier in the day Mr Cummings had given a scathing review of the Department of Health and Social Care’s response, claiming Health , secretary Matt Hancock should have been fired.
Cummings, who left Downing Street last year after a behind-the-scenes power struggle, told the MPs: “The truth is that senior ministers, senior officials, senior advisers like me fell disastrously short of the standards that the public has a right to expect of its Government in a crisis like this.
“When the public needed us most, the Government failed.
“I would like to say to all the families of those who died unnecessarily how sorry I am for the mistakes that were made and for my own mistakes at that.”
In a series of explosive claims, Mr Cummings said:
– The Government was not operating on a “war footing” in February 2020 as the global crisis mounted, with the Prime Minister on holiday and “lots of key people were literally skiing”.
– Mr Johnson thought Covid-19 was just a “scare story” and the “new swine flu” and it was suggested chief medical officer Professor Chris Whitty should inject him with the virus on live TV.
– Herd immunity from people catching the disease was thought to be inevitable because there was no plan to try to suppress the spread of the virus.
– Cabinet secretary Sir Mark Sedwill told the Prime Minister to go on TV and explain the herd immunity plan by saying “it’s like the old chicken pox parties, we need people to get this disease because that’s how we get herd immunity by September”.
Mr Cummings described his mounting panic about the situation in March 2020, with no plan in place for a lockdown or measures to protect the most vulnerable.
He claimed the Government’s delay in locking down and lack of an action plan was similar to sci-fi movie Independence Day, in which the US is devastated by a surprise alien invasion, and compared his data expert colleague Ben Warner to Jeff Goldblum’s scientist in the film whose warnings were ignored.
The former aide left Downing Street in November 2020 following a power struggle behind the scenes involving Mr Johnson’s fiancee Carrie Symonds.
Mr Cummings suggested she had been part of the problem during March 2020.
On March 12 he warned there were “big problems coming” if self-isolation measures were not announced immediately but the Government was focused on other issues – a “completely trivial” story about the prime ministerial pet dog Dilyn.
“The Prime Minister’s girlfriend was going completely crackers about this story and demanding that the press office deal with that,” Mr Cummings said.
Mr Cummings said that on the evening of March 13 it was realised that a meeting would need to be held with Mr Johnson to explain “we’re going to have to ditch the whole official plan, we’re heading for the biggest disaster this country has seen since 1914”.
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