Government ‘failed its citizens’ with botched pandemic planning, Covid Inquiry report states

The first part of the public inquiry into Covid-19, a 217-page report on pandemic preparedness, was published yesterday.

It said there was a “damaging absence of focus” on the measures and infrastructure that would be needed to deal with a fast-spreading disease, even though a coronavirus outbreak at pandemic scale “was foreseeable”.

Baroness Hallett said the government “prepared for the wrong pandemic”, and its flu plan was “inadequate for a global pandemic of the kind that struck”.

The inquiry said it had “no hesitation” in concluding that the “processes, planning and policy of the civil contingencies structures within the UK government and devolved administrations and civil services failed their citizens”.

Baroness Hallett said lessons must be learned because, “unless we are better prepared”, the next pandemic will “bring with it immense suffering and huge financial cost, and the most vulnerable in society will suffer the most.”

She added: “There were serious errors on the part of the state and serious flaws in our civil emergency systems. This cannot be allowed to happen again.”

Baroness Hallett made 10 recommendations to avoid another crisis, which killed hundreds of thousands of people.

Among them were a requirement to carry out national response exercises every three years and the creation of external “red teams” of experts to challenge “the acute problem of groupthink” in government.

In a written ministerial statement afterwards, the Prime Minister said he was “personally committed” to learning the lessons of the pandemic.

Sir Keir Starmer said: “The Government’s first responsibility is to keep the public safe, and as Prime Minister I am personally committed to each and every family that lost loved ones, and whose lives were changed forever, that this Government will learn the lessons from the inquiry.

“This means ensuring that the UK is prepared for a future pandemic, as well as the broadest range of potential risks facing our country. That is a top priority for this government and what everyone should rightly expect from a government working in their service.”

The Hospital Consultants and Specialists Association president, Dr Naru Narayanan, said the “next pandemic is a matter of when, not if”.

He said: “This lays bare the dereliction of duty at the top in the years leading up to the worst global healthcare emergency of modern times.

“Complacency in government left us grossly unprepared in the complete absence of any serious planning for a Covid-style pandemic.

“The false economy of underfunding NHS services left them in the worst possible place in the run-up to 2020.”

Dr Narayanan said doctors, their colleagues and patients “were all victims of this incompetent lack of contingency planning and effectively left to fend for themselves when the pandemic hit”.

“Countless deaths, the trauma of working in horrific circumstances and lengthy lockdowns have scarred lives and an entire generation as a result,” he added.

“The fact is that the next pandemic is a matter of when, not if.

“Never again can a government be allowed to neglect its responsibility to plan, stockpile and protect its front-line workers and the wider population.

A spokesperson for Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice UK group said the report “has not gone far enough” in setting out how inequalities in public services can be addressed.

They said: “We ask for this government to produce a plan to address health inequalities and in its first 100 days conduct a cross-departmental audit into pandemic preparedness.

“We are also calling for the government to establish a minister for resilience and preparedness.

“We need somebody with ultimate responsibility for an emergency response who we can hold to account.”