Families of COVID-19 victims have attacked an MPs’ report into government failings during the pandemic as “laughable” and a “slap in the face” – and say a judicial inquiry is needed to get to the truth.
The report said decisions on lockdowns and social distancing early in the pandemic were “one of the most important public health failures the United Kingdom has ever experienced” and cost thousands of lives.
It said “groupthink” among officials meant chances to delay the spread of the virus were missed, and it was a “serious early error” not to lock down sooner.
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Spokesperson for the COVID-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group, Hannah Brady, said the report is a “slap in the face” for relatives of those who died.
“The report is 122 pages long, but manages to barely mention the over 150,000 bereaved families,” she said.
“Sadly, this is what we expected, as the committee explicitly refused to speak to us or any bereaved families, instead insisting they were only interested in speaking to their colleagues and friends.
“The report it’s produced is laughable, and more interested in political arguments… than it is in the experiences of those who tragically lost parents, partners or children to COVID-19.
“This is an attempt to ignore and gaslight bereaved families, who will see it as a slap in the face.”
Ms Brady also criticised a passage in the report that said the success of the vaccine rollout had “redeemed many of the persistent failings of other parts of the national response”.
She said a judge-led public inquiry – promised by the prime minister – is vital and must focus on the experiences of families.
“That is the only way that the serious questions, like why families were told their loved ones were not fit for intensive care without medical assessment, or advised by 111 to keep their loved ones at home even in their dying moments, or why there were even more deaths in care homes in the second wave than the first, will be answered,” she said.
Last month, families met Boris Johnson about the inquiry – slated to begin in spring – and later posed with pictures of their loved ones at the COVID Memorial Wall in London.
The prime minister has committed to appointing an inquiry chairperson by Christmas and said families will have an input into who is chosen.
Pleas for a rigorous judge-led inquiry are echoed by Lindsay Jackson, whose mother Sylvia died with the virus in a care home in April 2020.
Ms Jackson told Sky News the report was “cathartic” and “in some way validating” – but confirmed her “worst suspicions about the mistakes that have been made”.
She said: “I don’t know that it tells me anything new, but it definitely confirms my thoughts about things like the slowness of the lockdown, the lack of care for residential homes and people within them, the dreadful discharge of people from hospitals without tests.”
Ms Jackson said “a full judicial inquiry where people are forced to attend, forced to speak under oath” is the only way to get the truth.
“The people who spoke to this inquiry did so willingly, relatively informally… [It] needs to be done properly under the rule of law,” she told Sky News.
She said attempts at apologies from the government were “shabby” and attacked claims by former health secretary Matt Hancock last year that a “protective ring” had been put around care homes in the early stages of the pandemic.
“It was a lie then, it’s a lie now. There was no protective ring,” said Ms Jackson.
“What I read from this review, despite the deaths in the first wave there was only an official committee established to consider the plight of people in social care in June 2020… after many thousands of people passed away.”
Jean Adamson’s 98-year-old father also died with COVID caught in a care home in April 2020.
She told Sky News the facility “did their best” but that it was following government policy which at the time didn’t require people going into the homes to have a negative test.
“There were people admitted, discharged from hospital to the care home during that period of time running up to the first wave, without having had a negative COVID test,” she said.
“They were under a lot of pressure to take admissions from the NHS because the mantra was ‘protect the NHS’,” said Ms Adamson.
“Very little thought was given to the most vulnerable members of society, the elderly in care homes.”
She told Sky News she was “very sad to think my father and many thousands of others died needlessly” and that “accountability for this national tragedy is firmly at the doors of 10 Downing Street”.
Ms Adamson said families had been “treated with contempt” as they hadn’t been asked to contribute to the report, which she said simply confirmed what they already knew.
Earlier, a government minister refused to apologise 11 times for the government’s handling of the pandemic.
Cabinet Office minister Stephen Barclay told Sky News’ Kay Burley: “We followed, throughout, the scientific advice. We got the vaccine deployed extremely quickly, we protected our NHS from the surge of cases.
“Of course, if there are lessons to learn we’re keen to do so.”
Asked again if he would be apologising in the wake of the report, Mr Barclay replied: “Well no, we followed the scientific advice, we protected the NHS, we took the decisions based on the evidence before us.
“But of course, we’ve always said with something so unprecedented as the pandemic, there will be lessons to learn, we’re keen to learn them.”
Boris Johnson said earlier this year that he took “full responsibility for everything that has happened” and was “truly sorry for the suffering the people of this country have experienced”.
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said the prime minister should “address the families, apologise and bring forward the public inquiry just as quickly as possible”.
“My thoughts are with the families who’ve lost people because of these failures by the government,” he said.