UK pandemic preparations undermined by Brexit, Covid inquiry told

The preoccupation with Brexit planning drained resources from pandemic preparations that the UK government knew were needed, the opening session of the official Covid-19 inquiry was told on Tuesday.

Speaking on the first day of public hearings, Hugh Keith, the inquiry’s chief counsel, said the preparations for Brexit had required a great deal of planning, particularly to address what were likely to be “the severe consequences of leaving the EU without a deal”.

Mr Keith told the inquiry that rather than improving the government’s generic capacity to respond to a civil emergency, Brexit preparations had diverted attention from pandemic planning by the time coronavirus started to spread in the UK in early 2020, weeks after the UK left the European Union.

“It is clear that such planning from 2018 onwards crowded out and prevented some or perhaps a majority of the improvements that central government itself understood were required to be made to resilience planning and preparedness,” he said.

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The opening session of the long-awaited inquiry, which is expected to last until 2026, will have made for uncomfortable listening for prime minister Rishi Sunak, who was chancellor during the pandemic, as well the previous Conservative-led governments over more than a decade.

The first of the six so-called modules, which make up inquiry, will run for six weeks and will focus on how well prepared the UK was for a pandemic and the resilience of its institutions and public health at the time Covid struck.

“Even at this stage before hearing the evidence, it is apparent that we might not have been very well prepared at all,” Mr Keith said in his introductory remarks.

Among areas that will be investigated will be an organisational framework for emergencies described as “labyrinthine”, the impact of years of government austerity on the level of resourcing for health and local services and the extent to which ministers heeded their own warnings about pandemic threats.

UK government assumptions that the country was in good shape to offer “substantial protection to the public” were based on planning that focused too heavily on influenza over other diseases, Mr Keith said.

It was extraordinary, he added, in light of how lockdowns had since been seared on the national consciousness, that no debate had taken place in advance of the pandemic on whether they might be necessary.

“Fundamentally, we were taken by surprise,” he said, adding: “Huge, urgent and complex policy decisions were required to be taken in relation to shielding, employment support, managing disruption to schools, borders, lockdowns and non-pharmaceutical interventions.”

“Equally important was the profoundly unequal impact on the vulnerable and marginalised. Few of those areas were anticipated let alone considered in detail.”

Baroness Heather Hallett, the inquiry’s chair, said that because its findings were key to Britain’s preparedness for future pandemics, they would be released progressively as hearings unfold.

As bereaved relatives held a vigil outside, Ms Hallett acknowledged in her opening statement that some would be unhappy they would not be playing a more direct role in the inquiry.

She said families of Covid victims would be able to contribute their experiences online. Some had given pre-recorded impact testimony, the first of which was shown on Tuesday.

[ ‘What the hell went wrong?’: bereaved hope for answers as UK Covid inquiry begins ]

“I hope they will understand when they see the results of the work we are doing that I am listening to them. Their loss will be recognised,” she said.

Providing a detailed list of questions that bereaved families want the inquiry to answer, Pete Wetherby, their counsel, concluded: “If the last three and a half years have taught us anything, proper planning, adequate resourcing and swift action saves lives.

“From the families’ perspectives, the UK had none of those three things. They want to know why and they want it to change.” – The Financial Times