Boris Johnson suggested he thought COVID was ‘nature’s way of dealing with old people’
Boris Johnson suggested he saw COVID as “nature’s way of dealing with old people” and was “obsessed” with them accepting their fate, the inquiry into the pandemic has heard.
During a hearing on Tuesday, notes were shared from the government’s former chief scientist describing a “bonkers set of exchanges”.
Sir Patrick Vallance wrote in one of his notebooks in August 2020 that Mr Johnson was “obsessed with older people accepting their fate and letting the young get on with life and the economy going. Quite bonkers set of exchanges”.
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Another note from Sir Patrick in December 2020 suggested the then prime minister agreed with Tory MPs that COVID was “nature’s way of dealing with old people”.
Sir Patrick wrote: “PM told he has been acting early and the public are with him (but his party is not). He says his party ‘thinks the whole thing is pathetic and Covid is just Nature’s way of dealing with old people – and I am not entirely sure I disagree with them. A lot of moderate people think it is a bit too much’. Wants to rely on polling.”
The messages were shared during the evidence session of Lee Cain – Mr Johnson’s former director of communications.
He told the inquiry that the former prime minister was indecisive over whether or not to impose a circuit-breaker lockdown in September 2020 because it was “very much against what’s in his political DNA”.
Mr Cain said his own research led him to believe that the public mood was more cautious, contrary to that of the Tory Party.
Counsel to the inquiry Andrew O’Connor asked: “And was this one of the factors that underpinned the prime minister’s indecision later in 2020, September/October time, whether or not to have a circuit-breaker lockdown?”
Mr Cain said: “Yes…he felt torn where the evidence on one side and public opinion and scientific evidence was very much caution, slow – we’re almost certainly going to have to do another suppression measure, so we need to have that in mind – where media opinion and certainly the rump of the Tory party was pushing him hard (in) the other direction.”
The session also heard:
- Mr Cain thought Mr Johnson was the “wrong” prime minister for COVID as he “oscillated” on key issues;
- His inability to make a decision was described as “exhausting”;
- A lack of diversity in Johnson’s top team led to the “wrong decision” on certain policies, including free school meals;
- “Indecision” was a theme in Downing Street – and it took 11 days to implement a lockdown from deciding there needed to be one.
Johnson ‘in Jaws mode’ before announcing lockdown
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Cummings says PM was known as a ‘trolley’
Other messages shared at the session revealed Mr Johnson was “melting down” and going into “Jaws Mode” in the week before the UK’s first national lockdown.
The hearing heard that a crunch meeting on 14 March saw key government figures agree that a lockdown was needed – but one was not implemented until 10 days later.
In between that time, texts show Mr Johnson’s former top aide Dominic Cummings venting about the then prime minister returning to “Jaws mode” – a reference to the mayor in the Spielberg film who wanted to keep the beaches open.
The messages to Mr Cain on 19 March while Mr Cummings was in a meeting with Mr Johnson read: “Get in here he’s melting down.
“Rishi saying bond markets may fund our debt etc. He’s back to Jaws mode w****.
“I’ve literally said same thing 10 f****** times and he still won’t absorb it.
“I’m exhausted just talking to him and stopping the trolley.
“I’ve had to sit here for two hours just to stop him saying stupid s**t.”
Messages shared at the COVID inquiry between Dominic Cummings and Lee Cain
Cummings says ‘everyone called PM a trolley’
Mr Cummings, who was called to give evidence after Mr Cain, claimed that Mr Johnson was described as an indecisive “trolley” by “pretty much everyone” as defended the use of his expletives.
He apologised for another message in which he called ministers “useless f***pigs, morons, c****” but said if anything his language only “understated the position, as events showed in 2020”.
Mr Cain said he would not use some of the language Mr Cummings used – including calling the Cabinet Office “terrifyingly s***, but conceded there was “chaos” in government when COVID started to spread and the pandemic was the “wrong crisis for this prime minister’s skillset”.
He said: “It required quick decisions and you need people to hold the course and have that strength of mind to do that over a sustained period of time and not constantly unpick things because that’s where the problems lie.”
Johnson ‘failed to recognise tsunami of death’
It comes a day after the inquiry heard evidence from Martin Reynolds, the civil servant dubbed “Party Marty” due to his role in the partygate scandal.
The hearing revealed Mr Johnson’s closest advisers sent despairing messages about his apparent indecision at the height of the pandemic, with one venting that he “cannot lead” and was making government “impossible.
Deborah Lewis, the founder of a group for bereaved COVID families, said hearing about government failures during the inquiry is making it hard to “get closure” and move on.
She said when Mr Johnson appears before the inquiry he will need to answer “why he failed to recognise the tsunami of death that was heading towards us and why he didn’t take it seriously in the first place.”
She told Sky News: “We need to know why (the government) did that. Why were all of our loved ones not protected in the way they should have been by our government? “
The last blast furnaces left operating in Britain could see their fate sealed within days, after their Chinese owners took the decision to cut off the crucial supply of ingredients keeping them running.
Jingye, the owner of British Steel in Scunthorpe, has, according to union representatives, cancelled future orders for the iron ore, coal and other raw materials needed to keep the furnaces running.
The upshot is that they may have to close next month – even sooner than the earliest date suggested for its closure.
Read more: Thousands of jobs at risk as British Steel consults unions over closure
The fate of the blast furnaces – the last two domestic sources of virgin steel, made from iron ore rather than recycled – is likely to be determined in a matter of days, with the Department for Business and Trade now actively pondering nationalisation.
The upshot is that even as Britain contends with a trade war across the Atlantic, it is now working against the clock to secure the future of steelmaking at Scunthorpe.
The talks between the government and Jingye broke down last week after the Chinese company, which bought British Steel out of receivership in 2020, rejected a £500m offer of public money to replace the existing furnaces with electric arc furnaces.
The sum is the same one it offered to Tata Steel, which has shut down the other remaining UK blast furnaces in Port Talbot and is planning to build electric furnaces – which have far lower carbon emissions.
These steel workers could soon be out of work
However, the owners argue that the amount is too little to justify extra investment at Scunthorpe, and said last week they were now consulting on the date of shutting both the blast furnaces and the attached steelworks.
Since British Steel is the main provider of steel rails to Network Rail – as well as other construction steels available from only a few sites in the world – the closure would leave the UK more reliant on imports for critical infrastructure sites.
However, since the site belongs to its Chinese owners, a decision to nationalise the site would involve radical steps government officials are wary of taking.
They also fear leaving taxpayers exposed to a potentially loss-making business for the long run.
The dilemma has been heightened by the sharp turn in geopolitical sentiment following Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
The incipient trade war and threatened cut in American support to Europe have sparked fresh calls for countries to act urgently to secure their own supplies of critical materials, especially those used for defence and infrastructure.
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Gareth Stace, head of UK Steel, the industry lobby group, said: “Talks seem to have broken down between government and British Steel.
“My advice to government is: please, Jonathan Reynolds, Business Secretary, get back round that negotiating table, thrash out a deal, and if a deal can’t be found in the next few days, then I fear for the very future of the sector, but also here for Scunthorpe steelworks.”
British Steel declined to comment.
UK
Prince Andrew’s Pitch@Palace branded ‘crude attempt to enrich himself’ as Chinese spy documents set to be released
Prince Andrew’s efforts to make money from his Pitch@Palace project have been branded as a “crude attempt to enrich himself” at the expense of “unsuspecting tech founders”, as new documents may shed more light on what he and his team have been attempting to sell.
Today is the deadline for documents to be released relating to Prince Andrew‘s former senior adviser Dominic Hampshire and his interactions with the alleged Chinese spy Yang Tengbo.
In February, an immigration tribunal heard how the intelligence services had contacted Mr Hampshire about Mr Yang back in 2022. Mr Yang helped set up Pitch@Palace China, a branch of the duke’s scheme to help young entrepreneurs.
The alleged Chinese spy, Yang Tengbo, has links with Prince Andrew
Yang Tengbo. Pic: Pitch@Palace
Judges banned Mr Yang from the UK, saying his association with a senior royal had made Prince Andrew “vulnerable” and posed a threat to national security. Mr Yang challenged that decision at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC).
Since that hearing, media organisations have applied for certain documents relating to the case and Mr Hampshire’s support for Mr Yang to be made public. SIAC agreed to release some information of public interest. It is hoped they may include more details on deals that he was trying to do on behalf of Prince Andrew.
So what do we know about potential deals for Pitch@Palace so far?
In February, Sky News confirmed that palace officials had a meeting last summer with tech funding company StartupBootcamp to discuss a potential tie-up between them and Prince Andrew relating to his Pitch@Palace project.
The palace wasn’t involved in the fine details of a deal but wanted guarantees to make sure it wouldn’t impact the Royal Family in the future. Sky News understands from one source that the price being discussed for Pitch was around £750,000 – there are, however, reports that a deal may have stalled.
Photos we found on the Chinese Chamber of Commerce website show an event held in Asia between StartupBootcamp and Innovate Global, believed to be an offshoot of Pitch.
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Who is alleged Chinese spy, Yang Tengbo?
Documents, released in relation to the investigations into Mr Tengbo, have also shown how much the duke has always seen Pitch as a way of potentially making money. One document from 21 August 2021 clearly states “the duke needed money at the time, and saw the relationships with China through Pitch as one possible source of funding”.
But Prince Andrew’s apparent intention to use Pitch to make money has led to concerns about whether he is unfairly using the contacts and information he gained when he was a working royal.
Norman Baker, former MP and author of books on royal finances, believes it is “a crude attempt to enrich himself” and goes against what the tech entrepreneurs thought they were signing up for.
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He told Sky News: “The data given by these business people was given on the basis it was an official operation and not something for Prince Andrew, and so in my view, Prince Andrew had no right legally or morally to take the data which has been collected, a huge amount of data, and sell it…
“And quite clearly if you’re going to sell it off to StartupBootcamp, that is not what people had in mind. The entrepreneurs who joined Pitch@Palace did not do so to enrich Prince Andrew,” he said.
Rich Wilson was one tech entrepreneur who was approached at the start of Pitch@Palace to sign up, but he stepped away when he spotted a clause in the contract saying they’d be entitled to 2% equity in any funding he secured.
He feels Prince Andrew is continuing to use those he made a show of supporting.
He said: “It makes me feel sick. I think it’s terrible – that he is continuing to exploit unsuspecting tech founders in this way. A lot of them, I’m quite grey and old in the tooth now, I saw it coming, but clearly most didn’t. And a lot of them were quite young.
“It’ll be their first venture and you’re learning on the trot, so to speak. So to take advantage of people in such a major way – that’s an awful, sickening thing to do.”
We approached StartupBootcamp who said they had no comment to make, and the Duke of York’s office did not respond.
With reports that a deal may have stalled, it could be a big setback for the duke – especially with questions still about how he’ll continue to pay for his home on the Windsor estate now that the King no longer gives him financial support.
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