In so many ways, the Covid inquiry feels as if it is going very badly for the Tories. Seemingly every session in the plain, low-ceilinged, rather severe room next to Paddington station in London confirms more of our worst suspicions from the time of the pandemic about the Conservatives’ performance in government. That Boris Johnson, many of his ministers and some of his most senior advisers were disastrously unsuited to dealing with one of the most lethal crises Britain has ever faced is becoming ever clearer, question by question, document by document.
The lead counsel for the inquiry, Hugo Keith KC, sometimes uses phrases such as “failings in the heart of the government” when he is questioning ministers and ex-ministers – and even more ominously for them, when he is summarising or making observations about their answers. It’s hard to see at this stage how the inquiry’s report, the first part of which is currently scheduled for publication early next summer, can be anything other than damning. And Johnson and Rishi Sunak – or “Dr Death”, as one of the government’s most senior scientific advisers called him during the pandemic – haven’t even been interrogated by the inquiry yet. Johnson is scheduled to appear next week, with Sunak expected soon afterwards.
