Rishi Sunak's appearance at the Covid Inquiry yesterday was an utter disgrace. Having refused to hand over his WhatsApp messages to the Inquiry, our Prime Minister claimed he “could not recall” key information in response to 29 different questions. He simply deflected blame elsewhere and pretended the UK’s disastrous response to the pandemic had nothing to do with him.
The evidence, however, doesn’t lie. Rishi Sunak, or as the Chief Medical Officer called him, ‘Dr Death the Chancellor’, had a catalogue of failures to answer for at the UK Covid 19 Inquiry yesterday, from the ‘Eat Out to Help Out the Virus’ policy to refusing financial support for care workers to spread of Covid between care homes.
Rishi Sunak may apparently not remember his disastrous reign as Chancellor, but the public, and bereaved families in particular, remember all too well.
Our member Amanda Pape tragically lost her husband Bob as a direct result of Eat Out to Help Out. Bob was just 53, and along with Amanda and his two teenage daughters did everything he could to stick to the rules in the first wave. When the Government announced Eat Out to Help Out, Bob wanted to take the family for a weekend away in Birmingham. In Amanda’s words “Bob was convinced that the government would not allow people to travel if it wasn’t safe”. Motivated by Eat Out to Help Out, they ate at several restaurants: Five Guys, MacDonalds, Wetherspoons and others. Little did they know that Chris Witty was in fact calling the scheme “eat out to help out the virus” behind closed doors. Bob tragically caught the virus that weekend and passed away a few weeks later.
Meanwhile in Blackburn, our member Christina Cramsie has a similarly awful story. She remembers that if it wasn’t for Eat Out to Help, her dad wouldn’t have thought it was safe to go out. Kirsty Sumner remembers that when her dad was in hospital, fighting for his life, the whole system was unable to cope because of the vast number of admissions following the Eat Out to Help Out scheme. Naomi Fulop remembers that when her mother died at the height of the second wave, 1,000 people were dying every day, because Eat Out to Help Out had increased infection rates and communicated to the public that it was okay to let down our guard against the virus. And not a single person in the country doesn’t remember being plunged into a stricter, longer second lockdown than we would have needed had the government taken decisive and consistent action to stop the spread of Covid.
Polling over the weekend showed that the majority of people in the UK think Rishi Sunak would do a bad job if another pandemic struck. His total refusal to tell the truth in the Inquiry yesterday shows that they are right to think that. As ever, all that matters is “brand Rishi”, not public health or learning the lessons that might save lives if another pandemic struck in the future.
Over the last few days hundreds of our members have travelled to the Inquiry from all over the UK: Scotland, Cornwall, Northern Ireland, Wales, Newcastle, and everywhere in between. We will never stop fighting for the truth to come out about what happened to our loved ones and for lessons to be learned that will ensure others don’t have to go through the same awful experiences when another pandemic strikes.
By being there, both in the hearings and outside the courtroom, we make sure that everyone remembers the pain that the likes of Sunak inflicted on so many. We make sure they will not be let off the hook.
Even the smallest donation helps us to go an extra mile in our fight for justice and the truth. Please support us if you can to make sure the bereaved have a voice and the likes of “Dr Death the Chancellor” don’t get away with their awful decisions: https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/covid-bereaved-must-be-heard-at-the-covid-inquiry
With thanks for all your support,
Covid 19 Bereaved Families for Justice UK