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Discredited ex-PM faces a demolition job in one of the few policy areas to which he and his allies still cling
Even at the height of his popularity, Boris Johnson routinely avoided close questioning – to the extent of once hiding in a fridge to dodge a TV inquisitor. The former UK prime minister is likely to be dreading next week’s appearance at the Covid inquiry. And he probably should.
It is no exaggeration to say that events on Wednesday and Thursday at the inquiry’s repurposed office building in Paddington, west London, could help define the post-power image and legacy of Johnson, and very possibly not for the good.
Former chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallance revealed there was ‘complete lack of leadership’ at times in crisis
Vallance says that some of what he was doing during Covid would have been done by anyone else in the post of government chief scientific adviser (GCSA).
But he says because of his medical training, and his knowledge of vaccines (he had worked for GlaxoSmithKline before taking the GCSA job), he was probably more involved than another GCSA might have been.
Sir Patrick Vallance, the UK government’s chief scientific adviser throughout Covid, has been giving evidence to the inquiry into the pandemic on Monday. Here is what we have learned so far.
Rishi Sunak would almost certainly have known scientists were worried about his “eat out to help out” scheme during the pandemic, Sir Patrick Vallance has said, directly contradicting the prime minister’s evidence to the Covid inquiry.
In potentially damaging testimony, Vallance, the UK government’s chief scientific adviser during the pandemic, said he would be “very surprised” if Sunak had not learned about objections to his plan to help the hospitality industry.
Chief scientific adviser in 2020 found the ex-PM ‘completely inconsistent’ in his evidence to the Covid inquiry
Boris Johnson’s decision-making during the coronavirus pandemic was described as “bipolar” and “completely inconsistent” by Sir Patrick Vallance, the Covid inquiry has heard.
The government’s then chief scientific adviser acknowledged his frustration in his diary entries, which he has submitted to the panel as evidence, at the “chaos” in Downing Street and Johnson’s “flip-flopping” when making decisions about restrictions.
Angus Rose starved himself for more than five weeks outside parliament until Green MP Caroline Lucas arranged compromise
The climate hunger striker who starved himself for more than five weeks outside parliament has said he did not expect ministers would ignore his demands and potentially let him die.
Angus Rose had said he would not eat until Greg Hands, the energy minister, arranged for Sir Patrick Vallance, the chief scientist, to give politicians and, via broadcast, the public, the climate change briefing he gave to Boris Johnson before the Cop26 climate summit.
Prime minister had broached issue of asymptomatic transmission publicly with advisers long before testing rules were introduced
Boris Johnson’s claim that a lack of knowledge about the asymptomatic transmission of Covid-19 put care homes at risk has been further undermined after it emerged he openly discussed the potential scale of symptom-free transmission.
The prime minister has already been accused of misleading parliament over the claim. He made it last week after the high court ruled that the government had acted unlawfully in ordering the discharge of patients to care homes without testing in the spring of 2020. Johnson told the House of Commons: “What we didn’t know in particular was that Covid could be transmitted asymptomatically.”
The government’s two most senior advisers in the pandemic will turn their attention to health inequalities, the state of the UK’s air and emerging technologies following the milestone decision to end all legal Covid restrictions in England this week.
While the pandemic is far from over, Boris Johnson’s announcement on Monday of the “living with Covid” plan is expected to be the last time Sir Patrick Vallance, the chief scientific adviser, and Sir Chris Whitty, England’s chief medical officer, will flank the prime minister to explain the UK’s response.
Today marks the first day in nearly two years that no laws will be in place in England to deal with the spread of Covid-19. But is the government still following the science?
All the remaining Covid restrictions in England will be lifted today. Instead of a legal requirement to self-isolate when infected, people with coronavirus will be simply advised to avoid passing on the disease. But the government is also removing financial support for those self-isolating, as well as winding down its expensive contact-tracing infrastructure and refusing to continue funding tests for individuals.
It is a moment that has brought celebration to many in Boris Johnson’s Conservative party, a large number of whom have long been stridently opposing every new restrictive measure designed to curb the spread of the virus. But as the Guardian’s Peter Walker tells Hannah Moore, not everyone is overjoyed at the news. Many on the Labour benches detect an overtly political motivation that they say has trumped a more cautious science-backed approach to living with Covid. While Johnson claims to be moving to end restrictions in England faster than anywhere else in Europe, Scotland and Wales are moving notably slower. Meanwhile, those who have in the past been deemed clinically vulnerable to Covid are now expressing anger and anxiety about what is to come.
Demands grow for government science chiefs to reveal evidence backing move to lift last protective measures
A future variant of Covid-19 could be much more dangerous and cause far higher numbers of deaths and cases of serious illness than Omicron, leading UK scientists have warned.
As a result, many of them say that caution needs to be taken in lifting the last Covid restrictions in England, as Boris Johnson plans to do next week.
Downing Street sources are saying this morning that “no decisions have been made” on a move to plan B. But, frankly, an FT story carries more credibility in the Westminster media village.
Ben Riley-Smith, the Telegraph political editor, thinks the timing of such a move would be suspicious.
The parliamentary inquiry into the UK’s response to the Covid crisis raises the serious issue of transparency around scientific advice – and why this remains crucial even as the country moves beyond an emergency situation.
The 151-page Coronavirus: lessons learned to date report, led by two former Conservative ministers, has made it clear that advice from the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) should be rapidly placed in the public domain.
Twelve months ago, as a battle raged in Downing Street over whether to order a circuit-breaker lockdown, Prof Chris Whitty and Sir Patrick Vallance issued a stern public warning that England was headed for 200 deaths a day by November unless action was taken.
That was widely seen as a shocking and unacceptable figure. In the event, Boris Johnson finally caved in to the inevitable six weeks later, on 31 October, ordering a month-long lockdown.
Chief scientific adviser will head new government body looking at big bets in science and technology
The government’s chief scientific adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance, has been asked by Boris Johnson to investigate whether the UK’s successful vaccine procurement programme can be replicated in other areas of technology.
Vallance, who has become a household name following his appearances at coronavirus press conferences, will take on the new title of national technology adviser, serving alongside his current roles.
The prime minister arrived in his brand new, £2.6m press briefing room with the unmistakable vibe of a feckless absentee father, doing his Monday afternoon teleconference call. Trying to be so many things at once. He wants to be the fun one, so did a shout out to Ilkeston Cycle Club, who met at midnight as the clock turned on the 29 March; then a big up to Hillingdon lido, who did whatever they do there. He also wants to prove that, this time, he’s deadly serious, a grave and sober man of his word, and his brow is heavy with all the memories of why you might not believe him.
He has some new curtains he wants to show you, which are both union flags, and some rather sudden paintwork, a fierce Conservative blue, because obviously that’s the colour of authority and this is your government for ever. Though when you consider how much he could have spent on wallpaper, you have to look on the bright side. The intention of the new setting must have been jocular jingoism, but it came off a little mournful, slightly beseeching, like: “Look, I’ve bought an inflatable mattress, soon you’ll be able to stay the night!”
Boris Johnson has admitted there are many things he wishes he had done differently to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic as the UK marks a year since the first lockdown and remembers the 126,000 people who have died so far.
At a Downing Street press conference, England’s chief medical officer, Prof Chris Whitty, also conceded the country had endured “a bad outcome”, but the prime minister once again refused to commit to a public inquiry to look at the decisions taken by the government over the last year.
The UK government’s chief scientific adviser has suggested that coronavirus restrictions across the country could be tightened in the coming weeks. This follows a surge in cases of a new variant of the virus that is thought to be up to 70% more transmissible than the old strain. ‘I think it is likely that this will grow in numbers of the variant across the country and I think it’s likely, therefore, that measures will need to be increased in some places, in due course, not reduced,’ Sir Patrick Vallance told a Downing Street press conference.
Scotland came close to eliminating Covid during the first nationwide lockdown, according to genomic sequencing for Sage of 5,000 samples of the virus, the Scottish government believes.
Jason Leitch, the Scottish government’s national clinical director, said analysis by scientists in Edinburgh, Glasgow and St Andrews on the COG-UK consortium found that around 300 different strains of the virus were circulating in Scotland during the first wave.
That allows us to say this did get us incredibly close to eliminating the virus in our communities, but as we opened up, inevitably people began to travel across the UK [and] travel abroad. New strains were imported again into Scotland.
[This] indicates that, while lockdown in Scotland is directly linked with the first wave case numbers being brought under control, travel-associated imports (mostly from Europe or other parts of the UK) following the easing of lockdown are responsible for seeding the current epidemic population.
This demonstrates that the impact of stringent public health measures can be compromised if, following this, movements from regions of high to low prevalence are not minimised.
Public Health Wales has recorded 2,238 further coronavirus cases. That is a new record daily high for recorded cases. The previous daily record was 2,021, on Monday. A week ago today the figure was 1,480.
There have also been 31 further deaths. A week ago today the figure was 51.
The rapid COVID-19 surveillance dashboard has been updated.
The chief medical officer for England has told MPs the aim of the lockdown is to reduce infection rates to a point where there is a 'realistic possibility' of restrictions being eased after 2 December. England will enter a second national lockdown on Thursday after a steep rise in the number of coronavirus infections and hospital admissions in many areas of the country. The UK's chief scientific adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance, said test and trace was not having a 'big impact' on the prevalence of the virus