DANIEL JOHNSON: Will there be an end to the post-pandemic blame game?
DANIEL JOHNSON: Former PM Boris Johnson being thrown to the wolves is an unedifying spectacle… will there ever be an end to the post-pandemic blame game?
Will there ever be an end to the post-pandemic blame game? I, for one, am filled with dread at the self-righteous posturing of Whitehall busybodies, pompous politicians and self-appointed moral arbiters.
All they care about is finding scapegoats in their feeding frenzy, picking over the national trauma of the Covid tragedy to damage the Government.
Last week we discovered that civil servants had reported Boris Johnson to the police for yet more possible breaches of lockdown rules.
Now we learn of a row between ministers and the former judge Lady Hallett, who has given them until tomorrow to hand over unredacted evidence, including private WhatsApp messages, to the inquiry which she is chairing.
As usual, it is Boris in the firing line. A year ago the Establishment hounded him from office, but it isn’t finished with him yet.
DANIEL JOHNSON: Last week we discovered that civil servants had reported Boris Johnson (pictured) to the police for yet more possible breaches of lockdown rules
Entries in his diaries about previously unknown visits to Chequers, the prime ministerial country home, were flagged up by government lawyers tasked with gathering evidence for Lady Hallett’s inquiry.
They alerted the Cabinet Office, which passed the material on to Scotland Yard and Thames Valley Police. Mr Johnson found himself being investigated again. Understandably, in my view, he feels he had been stitched up.
Of course, the Commons Privileges Committee, which has spent more than a year investigating whether the former PM lied to Parliament about ‘Partygate’, has pounced on the new material.
In the meantime, people expect the Government to address their immediate problems, such as controlling immigration and the cost of living, writes DANIEL JOHNSON (pictured)
The committee is packed with MPs who loathe Boris and it holds the power to suspend him from the House and trigger a process that could lead to a by-election in his marginal constituency of Uxbridge and South Ruislip.
The Boris camp, in turn, blames Oliver Dowden, the Deputy Prime Minister in charge of the Cabinet Office, for failing to protect his former boss. Behind Mr Dowden is, of course, Rishi Sunak.
So we have the unedifying spectacle, a year before the next general election, of a former prime minister being thrown to the wolves and forced to retaliate.
Mr Sunak, too, will come under scrutiny for his record as chancellor during the pandemic, especially his controversial ‘Eat Out to Help Out’ initiative.
It is the massive spending by the Exchequer during Covid which fuelled the inflationary crisis now affecting every household in the country.
It seems likely that the politicians who ousted Mr Johnson for his alleged failings during the pandemic will soon get a taste of their own medicine.
I take no pleasure in watching the Government devour itself. Nor do I want those who were genuinely culpable to get away with their misconduct.
We owe it to all who died, who lost loved ones or who suffered themselves to learn lessons from the nation’s response to the crisis. It was, let us remember, Mr Johnson himself who set up the Covid inquiry.
DANIEL JOHNSON: Yet I would urge Lady Hallett (pictured) to play the ball, not the man. The point of spending countless millions on an inquiry is not to parcel out blame to individuals, but to improve the system for dealing with major emergencies
Yet I would urge Lady Hallett to play the ball, not the man. The point of spending countless millions on an inquiry is not to parcel out blame to individuals, but to improve the system for dealing with major emergencies.
Boris Johnson deserves credit for his courageous leadership during the dark days before scientists had come up with adequate medical treatment for the virus.
He himself almost died of Covid in St Thomas’ Hospital. He showed foresight in backing the Oxford-AstraZeneca team to create a vaccine that saved hundreds of thousands of lives here and millions abroad.
It was Boris, too, who appointed Dame Kate Bingham to set up the Vaccine Taskforce, which got tens of millions of needles into arms in double quick time.
These triumphs should not be forgotten when the inquiry comes to draw conclusions.
In the meantime, people expect the Government to address their immediate problems, such as controlling immigration and the cost of living.
Britain cannot afford to indulge in settling scores from the past, while neglecting the crises of the present.
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