COVID ‘exposed’ UK’s vulnerability and government was not ‘fully prepared’, report finds
The government was not “fully prepared” for the “wide-ranging impacts” of the coronavirus pandemic, according to a new report, which found that Brexit both helped and hindered preparations for future crises.
There was a lack of detailed plans for shielding, job support schemes and school disruption, the National Audit Office found.
According to the watchdog, lessons from previous “simulation exercises” that would have helped when COVID-19 hit were “not fully implemented”.
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May: PM establishes COVID inquiry
“This pandemic has exposed the UK’s vulnerability to whole-system emergencies, where the emergency is so broad that it engages all levels of government and society,” said Gareth Davies, head of the NAO.
“Although the government had plans for a flu pandemic, it was not prepared for a pandemic like COVID-19 and did not learn important lessons from the simulation exercises it carried out.”
A government spokesperson defended its handling of COVID, stressing the “unprecedented” nature of the pandemic.
“We have always said there are lessons to be learnt from the pandemic and have committed to a full public inquiry in spring,” they said.
“We prepare for a range of scenarios and while there were extensive arrangements in place, this is an unprecedented pandemic that has challenged health systems around the world.
“Thanks to our collective national effort and our preparations for flu, we have saved lives, vaccinated tens of millions of people and prevented the NHS from being overwhelmed.”
The NAO said that resources dedicated to preparing for Britain’s exit from the European Union had both a positive and negative impact on planning for future crises.
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March 2020: Life under lockdown
In some instances, work on Brexit enhanced the “crisis capabilities” of certain government departments.
But on the flipside, the strain on resources meant the government had to pause or postpone some planning work for a potential flu pandemic.
“Some work areas of the Pandemic Flu Readiness Board and the Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Programme Board, including scheduling a pandemic influenza exercise in 2019-20, were paused or postponed to free up resources for EU exit work,” the report said.
Of the Cabinet Office’s 94 full-time equivalent staff in its emergency planning unit, 56 were allocated to prepare for potential disruption caused by a no-deal Brexit.
The NAO said this had the result of “limiting its ability” to plan for other crises.
“This raises a challenge for the government as to whether it has the capacity to deal with multiple emergencies or shocks,” its report said.
According to the NAO, the pandemic has “exposed a vulnerability to whole-system emergencies”.
And while ministers had plans to try and handle a pandemic, many of them were “not adequate” for the challenges that COVID posed, it said.
The report cited the findings of Exercise Winter Willow, a large-scale pandemic simulation exercise from 2007.
This found that business continuity plans needed to be “better coordinated” between organisations, but the NAO said this was “not evidence in most of the plans it reviewed.
In the wake of another pandemic simulation, Exercise Cygnus in 2016, the government noted that “consideration should be given to the ability of staff to work from home, particularly when staff needed access to secure computer systems”.
But the NAO said that when coronavirus reached the UK, “many departmental business continuity plans did not include arrangements for extensive home working”.
The watchdog found that the government prioritised preparations for “two specific viral risks” – an influenza pandemic and an emergency high-consequence infectious disease.
As a result, there was no plan specific to a disease with the characteristics of COVID, with it being found that scientists considered such a disease “less likely” to occur.
While the report noted that the government was able to use some of the mitigations it had in place when the pandemic struck, such as the stockpile of personal protective equipment (PPE), it was “not fully prepared” for the “wide-ranging impacts” the virus would have on society, the economy, and key public services.
The NAO queried why this was the case, given that the government’s 2019 National Security Risk Assessment said that a flu-like pandemic could have “extensive non-health impacts, including on communications, education, energy supplies, finance, food supplies and transport services”.
In addition, the watchdog said that there was no agreement in government of “what level of risk it was willing to accept for an event like COVID-19”.
According to the NAO, it was told by the Cabinet Office that the government’s “risk appetite changed” and it “lowered the threshold for the health and societal impacts of the pandemic that it deemed acceptable” as COVID hit.
In conclusion, the NAO found that the pandemic had flagged up the need to beef up the government’s risk management process and “national resilience” to be ready for future crises of a similar nature.
It made a number of recommendations to the Cabinet Office on risk management and preparedness.
The watchdog did note that the government had already begun considering how to address the issues raised in its report, for instance through its National Resilience Strategy.
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Lobby Akinnola, a spokesperson for the COVID-19 Bereaved Families for Justice campaign group, said the report “confirms what the whole country has long known, that the government was unprepared for the pandemic and that our loved ones might be here today if they had been”.
“What’s most important now is that the government is able to learn lessons from the inquiry to ensure that we are never in this position again.”
Labour’s shadow cabinet office minister Fleur Anderson said the report shows that ministers “failed to prepare and they failed the public”.
“It is vital that preparedness and planning is addressed in the public inquiry into the Conservatives’ mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic,” she said.
Sir Ed Davey, leader of the Liberal Democrats, said: “This is a damning report that reveals a comprehensive failure from the government to prepare adequately for the pandemic.”
Three men have been jailed for a combined total of 99 years for plotting to murder a member of a gang that carried out Britain’s biggest-ever cash robbery.
Paul Allen, 46, was shot twice as he stood in his kitchen in Woodford, east London, on 11 July 2019.
He was a member of the Securitas heist gang that stole £54m from a cash depot in Tonbridge, Kent, in 2006.
The former cage fighter was living in a large detached rented house with his partner and three young children after being released from an 18-year prison sentence over the raid.
The attack at his home has left him paralysed from the chest down.
Louis Ahearne, 36, Stewart Ahearne, 46, and Daniel Kelly, 46, denied conspiring to murder Allen but were found guilty last month following a trial at the Old Bailey.
The trio were sentenced at the Old Bailey in central London on Friday.
Kelly was sentenced to 36 years in prison and an extra five years on licence, Louis Ahearne was jailed for 33 years, and his sibling Stewart Ahearne – 30 years.
Damage to the kitchen door. Pic: Met Police/PA
A bullet casing found in the back garden. Pic: Met Police
Prosecutors did not give a motive for the murder plot, though they described the victim as a “sophisticated” career criminal.
Detectives said the shooting could seem like “the plot [of] a Hollywood blockbuster” but added it was actually “horrific criminality” from “hardened organised criminals”.
In her sentencing remarks, the judge said she believed the trio “were motivated by a promise of financial gain”.
Judge Sarah Whitehouse KC said: “I have no doubt that this agreement to murder Paul Allen involved other people apart from the three of you and that you three were motivated by a promise of financial gain.
“The culpability of each one of you is very high.
“The harm caused to the victim was very serious – indeed, short of killing him it could hardly be more serious. He is currently paralysed and relies on others for every single need.”
The shooting was just the latest act in a long list of criminal deeds. The day before, Kelly and Louise Ahearne used a rented car to carry out a burglary in Kent, accessing the gated community by pretending to be police officers.
A month before that, the trio had stolen more than $3.5m (£2.78m) worth of Ming dynasty antiques from the Museum of Far Eastern Arts in Geneva, for which the Ahearne brothers had been jailed in Switzerland.
Kelly is also wanted in Japan over the robbery of a Tokyo jewellery store in 2015 in which a security guard was punched in the face.
A man has been jailed for life for the murder of university lecturer Claire Chick.
Paul Butler was sentenced to a minimum term of 27 years for killing his estranged wife after a six-month campaign of stalking and harassment when he refused to accept their relationship was over.
Ms Chick, 48, was found seriously injured on West Hoe Road in Plymouth just before 9pm on 22 January. She was taken to hospital, but died the next day.
Previously known as Claire Butler, Ms Chick worked at the University of Plymouth.
Paul Butler has been jailed for murder. Pic: Devon & Cornwall Police
She died after a frenzied attack outside her home – the attack a culmination of months of harassment, stalking and violence at the hands of Butler.
Following her death, Devon and Cornwall Police made a referral to the police watchdog due to previous contact prior to her death.
Jo Martin KC, prosecuting, said Ms Chick had made six statements to the police about Butler and he had been arrested three times.
In her final statement to police the day before he killed her outside her own home, she said: “I only feel that Butler will kill me if further action is not taken. I am in fear of leaving my house.”
Butler was arrested around 20 miles away in the Liskeard area on 24 January.
He was sentenced on Friday at Plymouth Crown Court, having previously pleaded guilty to murder, and to one charge of possession of a bladed article.
‘I loved Claire’
The family of Ms Chick told the court how her murder left a “huge void” in their lives.
Her eldest daughter, Bethany Hancock-Baxter, described Butler as “evil”.
She said: “I want this evil man to listen to me. I want you to know what you have done to us as a family.
“Despite all the hate I have for you, I cannot bring myself to do what you did to my mum – that’s because I am not evil like you.”
Her sister, Lydia Peers, said Butler was a “parasite”.
After her short-lived marriage to Butler, Ms Chick began a relationship with another man, Paul Maxwell.
Mr Maxwell spoke from the witness box and repeatedly stared at the defendant as he spoke. Butler stared back at him.
“I loved Claire. She was beautiful, funny and kind,” Mr Maxwell said.
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Vincent Nichols: British cardinal who will be in the conclave says picking the next pope is ‘intimidating’
The head of the Catholic Church in England and Wales has told Sky News it’s “intimidating” to be one of those responsible for choosing the next pope.
Vincent Nichols is among four UK cardinals in Rome for the Pope’s funeral on Saturday.
Following the funeral, and after nine days of mourning, cardinals from around the world will gather in the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel to cast their votes, with white smoke announcing to the world when a new pope has been elected.
Cardinal Vincent Nichols speaks to Sky’s Anna Botting
Cardinal Nichols told Sky’s Anna Botting: “I hope nobody goes into this conclave, as it were, with the sole purpose of wanting to win. I think it’s very important that we go in wanting to listen to each other… It has to be together, trying to sense what God wants next. Not just for the church.”
He described the procession that took Pope Francis to lie in state as “the most moving thing I’ve ever attended here”.
Describing the Pope as a “master of the gesture and the phrase”, he also recalled the pontiff’s last journey away from the Vatican.
Cardinal Nichols said Pope Francis had visited the Regina Coeli prison, telling the inmates: “You know, except for the grace of God, it could well have been me … Don’t lose hope, God has you written in his heart.”
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‘Pope touched the hearts of millions’
The Pope later told his doctor his last regret was not being able to wash the feet of the prisoners during that visit.
Becoming emotional, he also said the final message he would like to have given Pope Francis is “thank you”.
The 88-year-old died peacefully on Easter Monday, the Vatican confirmed.
Heads of state – including Sir Keir Starmer, Donald Trump, Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Emmanuel Macron – have all confirmed their attendance at his funeral, which takes place on Saturday at St Peter’s Square.
Prince William will attend on behalf of the King, Kensington Palace has said.
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Where will Pope Francis be buried?
Talking about the seating plan at the funeral, Cardinal Nichols said he understood it to be “royalty first, then heads of state, then political leaders”.
Worldwide geopolitical tensions mean that many eyes will be on interactions between heads of state at the event, with particular focus on Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy following their tense meeting at the Oval Office in February.
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Pope’s cause of death confirmed .
Looking back at the last papal funeral, Cardinal Nichols described the seating of the then Prince Charles one seat away from Zimbabwean present Robert Mugabe as “obviously a little bit tense”.
Cardinal Nichols explained event would be “exactly the same Catholic rite as everyone else – just on a grander scale”.
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3D map shows pope’s funeral route
In a break from tradition, Pope Francis will be the first pope in a century to be interred outside the Vatican – and will instead be laid to rest at his favourite church, Santa Maria Maggiore Basilica in Rome’s Esquilino neighbourhood.
He will also be buried in just one simple wooden coffin, instead of the traditional three coffins which are usually used for pontiffs.
Born in Crosby near Liverpool, Cardinal Vincent Nichols hoped to be a lorry driver as a child – but as a teenager reportedly felt the calling to join the priesthood while watching Liverpool FC.
As cardinal, he is known for leading the church’s work tackling human trafficking and modern slavery, for which he received the UN Path to Peace Award.
He was criticised by the UK’s Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, which said he “demonstrated a lack of understanding” of the impact of abuse and “seemingly put the reputation of the church first”.
Cardinal Nichols, responding to the findings, previously told Sky News he was “ashamed at what has happened in the context of the Catholic Church” and promised to improve the church’s response.
He has appeared to rule himself out of the running for pope, telling reporters he was “too old, not capable”.
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