I LISTENED to Boris Johnson’s statement to the Covid inquiry, in which he said that there had been so many epidemics – SARS, MERS, Hong Kong Flu, etc that he did not think Covid would be any different, to the extent that he even went round hospital wards shaking hands with Covid patients, thus spreading the disease.

You could not make it up – the total incompetence beggars belief. At the end of 2019, Johnson spent a holiday in the Caribbean while medical professionals were warning of a PANDEMIC!

Every single member of the Conservative government totally IGNORED the medical experts’ advice. The Government’s OWN researchers identified a major outbreak of disease as a likely threat in the National Security Capability Review less than two years before Covid appeared. Pandemics were also identified as a security threat in reviews in 2010 and 2015.

Boris Johnson refused to take the pandemic seriously, refused to impose a lockdown early enough, refused to listen to the medical experts like Professor Van-Tam. He refused to attend the Cobra meetings at a time of national emergency. He was, as a prime minister, unfit for purpose. As for the Covid inquiry “learning lessons”, these words are used so often they have become meaningless.

Margaret Forbes

Blanefield