Matt Hancock defends use of taxpayer-funded Jaguar for COVID Inquiry appearances
Matt Hancock has defended using a taxpayer-funded Jaguar to take him to the COVID Inquiry – despite resigning from the government more than two years ago.
The Department for Health confirmed it provided the former health secretary with the chauffeur-driven car on three occasions when he appeared before the inquiry in June, November and December last year.
The revelation comes after the Daily Mirror submitted a Freedom of Information request to the government.
Although the cost of providing the car was not revealed, taxpayer money was used to fund it, the newspaper reported.
A spokesperson for Mr Hancock said it was “entirely reasonable” for the government to provide transport to and from the inquiry.
“Matt attended the COVID Inquiry entirely in his capacity as having been the secretary of state during the pandemic,” they said.
“It is entirely reasonable that the government should take care of his travel and security arrangements in this instance.”
Mr Hancock was a familiar face at the regular press conferences that took place during the pandemic.
But he was forced to resign in 2021 after he admitted breaking the government’s coronavirus guidance while pursuing an affair with an aide.
The inquiry, which has also heard other government figures including Boris Johnson and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, is examining the government’s response to the pandemic.
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Key moments from Matt Hancock at the COVID Inquiry
Appearing in front of the inquiry in December, the former health secretary acknowledged that leaked footage of him kissing aide Gina Coladangelo – which showed they broke social distancing guidelines – undermined public confidence in efforts to tackle coronavirus.
“What I’d say is that the lesson for the future is very clear,” he said.
“And it is important that those who make the rules abide by them, and I resigned in order to take accountability for my failure to do that.”
Mr Hancock also faced criticism from several witnesses at the inquiry, including from former deputy cabinet secretary Helen MacNamara. She accused him of showing “nuclear levels” of confidence at the start of the pandemic.
She claimed that Mr Hancock “regularly” told colleagues in Downing Street things “they later discovered weren’t true”.
Ms MacNamara said he would say things were under control or being sorted in meetings, only for it to emerge in days or weeks that “was not in fact the case”.
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The former senior civil servant also recalled a “jarring” incident when she told Mr Hancock that it must have been difficult to be health secretary during a pandemic.
She said he responded by miming playing cricket, adding: “They bowl them at me, I knock them away” during the first lockdown.
Mr Hancock currently sits as an independent MP in the Commons after he lost the Tory party whip for appearing on ITV’s I’m A Celebrity reality TV show.
In December 2022 he announced he would not stand for the Conservatives in the next general election.
Zoe Ball is leaving her BBC Radio 2 breakfast show after six years.
The 53-year-old, who recently lost her mother to cancer, will present her last show on Friday, 20 December.
Ball leaves Wogan House with her replacement, Scott Mills. Pic: PA
She said she was leaving to focus on family, but will remain part of the Radio 2 team and will give further details next year.
Announcing the news on her Tuesday show, she said: “After six years of fun times alongside you all on the breakfast show, I’ve decided it’s time to step away from the early alarm call and start a new chapter.
“You know I think the world of you all, listeners, and it truly has been such a privilege to share the mornings with you, to go through life’s little ups and downs, we got through the lockdown together, didn’t we?
“We’ve shared a hell of a lot, the good times, the tough times, there’s been a lot of laughter. And I am going to miss you cats.”
Scott Mills will replace Ball on the breakfast show following her departure next month.
“Zoe and I have been such good friends now for over 25 years and have spent much of that time as part of the same radio family here at Radio 2 and also on Radio 1,” he said.
“She’s done an incredible job on this show over the past six years, and I am beyond excited to be handed the baton.”
Hugging outside the BBC building on the day of the announcement, Ball said she was “really chuffed for my mate and really excited about it”.
Ball was the first female host of both the BBC Radio 1 and Radio 2 breakfast shows, starting at the Radio 1 breakfast show in 1998, and taking over her current Radio 2 role from Chris Evans in 2020 after he left the show.
She took a break from hosting her show over the summer, returning in September.
Ahead of her stint in radio, Ball – who is the daughter of children’s presenter Johnny Ball – co-hosted the BBC’s Saturday morning children’s magazine show Live & Kicking alongside Jamie Theakston for three years from 1996.
She has two children, Woody and Nelly, with her ex-husband, DJ and musician Norman Cook, known professionally as Fatboy Slim.
Ball said in her announcement her last show towards the end of December will be “just in time for Christmas with plenty of fun and shenanigans”.
“While I’m stepping away from the Breakfast Show, I’m not disappearing entirely – I’ll still be a part of the Radio 2 family, with more news in the New Year,” she added.
“I’m excited to embrace my next chapter, including being a mum in the mornings, and I can’t wait to tune in on the school run!”
Helen Thomas, head of Radio 2, said: “Zoe has woken up the nation on Radio 2 with incredible warmth, wit and so much joy since January 2019, and I’d like to thank her for approaching each show with as much vim and vigour as if it were her first. I’m thrilled that she’ll remain an important part of the Radio 2 family.”
Mills, 51, got his first presenting role aged just 16 for a local station in Hampshire, and went on to present in Bristol and Manchester, before joining BBC Radio 1 in 1998.
He’s previously worked as a cover presenter on Radio 2, but this is his first permanent role on the station.
UK
More prisoners are being transferred to less secure jails to tackle overcrowding crisis, Sky News understands
The prison service is starting to recategorise the security risk of offenders to ease capacity pressures, Sky News understands.
It involves lowering or reconsidering the threshold of certain offenders to move them from the closed prison estate (category A to C) to the open estate (category D) because there are more free cell spaces there.
Examples of this could include discounting adjudications – formal hearings when a prisoner is accused of breaking the rules – for certain offenders, so they don’t act as official reasons not to transport them to a lower-security jail.
Prisoners are also categorised according to an Incentives and Earned Privileges (IEP) status. There are different levels – basic, standard and enhanced – based on how they keep to the rules or display a commitment to rehabilitation.
Usually ‘enhanced’ prisoners take part in meaningful activity – employment and training – making them eligible among other factors, to be transferred to the open estate.
Insiders suggest this system in England and Wales is being rejigged so that greater numbers of ‘standard’ prisoners can transfer, whereas before it would more typically be those with ‘enhanced’ status.
Open prisons have minimal security and allow eligible prisoners to spend time on day release away from the prison on license conditions to carry out work or education.
The aim is to help reintegrate them back into society once they leave. As offenders near the end of their sentence, they are housed in open prisons.
Many of those released as part of the early release scheme in October after serving 40% of their sentence were freed from open prisons.
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Overcrowding in UK prisons
They were the second tranche of offenders freed as part of this scheme, and had been sentenced to five years or more.
Despite early release measures, prisons are still battling a chronic overcrowding crisis. The male estate is almost full, operating at around 97% capacity.
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Sky News understands there continue to be particular pinch points across the country.
Southwest England struggled over the weekend with three space-related ‘lockouts’ – which means prisoners are held in police suites or transferred to other jails because there is no space.
One inmate is believed to have been transported from Exeter to Cardiff.
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “The new government inherited a prison system on the point of collapse. We took the necessary action to stop our prisons from overflowing and to protect the public.
“This is not a new scheme. Only less-serious offenders who meet a strict criteria are eligible, and the Prison Service can exclude anyone who can’t be managed safely in a category D prison.”
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