A top Tory minister has rushed to Boris Johnson’s defence after a report on the Covid inquiry accused the ex-Prime Minister of running a “toxic, sexist and chaotic culture” during the pandemic.
Speaking to GB News, Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster Alex Burghart declared he “doesn’t recognise” the criticisms of Mr Johnson, despite the inquiry’s findings.
Covid Inquiry Chair Baroness Heather Hallett said the former Prime Minister at times “actively encouraged” a toxic culture during peak periods of the pandemic, leaving Downing Street on the back foot in its attempts to deal with Covid efficiently.
She stated: “Mr Johnson reinforced a culture in which the loudest voices prevailed and the views of other colleagues, particularly women, often went ignored, to the detriment of good decision-making.”
Alex Burghart has defended Boris Johnson’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic after the inquiry found a ‘toxic culture’ in No10
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GB NEWS / PA
Host Ellie Costello quizzed Mr Burghart on the inquiry’s findings, asking: “Lots of criticism for Boris Johnson in this report, Lady Hallett talking about a toxic, sexist and chaotic culture at the heart of Government. Do you think Boris Johnson led the Government well during that time? Do you recognise that criticism that’s levelled at him?”
Mr Burghart responded: “I don’t actually. I think I left London around about the 25th of March, and so I wasn’t working in No10, I was a political aide.
“But I did speak to a lot of people in No10, and I spoke to a lot of ministers. And in that period, they certainly don’t recognise that description.”
Highlighting the “stressful” situation the Conservatives were faced with in dealing with the pandemic, he added: “I just remember a very stressful, intense, fast-moving environment in which everyone was trying to do the best thing for the country that they possibly could.
Boris Johnson has been accused of leading a ‘toxic, sexist and chaotic culture at the heart of Government’
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Getty“Everyone was working incredibly long hours to try and work out what this thing was and what the possible solutions might be, and trying to balance all of the difficult things that we’ve been talking about.”
Defending Mr Johnson further, the Tory minister told GB News: “I’m certainly not going to criticise the Prime Minister of the day who had the most incredibly huge responsibility and who, as I’m sure your viewers will remember, very nearly died in April of that year, having contracted the virus himself and had been hospitalised.
“And I remember that episode very starkly.”
Delivering his verdict on the inquiry in general, Mr Burghart said that the findings will bring back “a lot of bad memories” for “a lot of people”.
Mr Burghart told GB News that the inquiry will ‘bring back a lot of bad memories for a lot of people’
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GB NEWS
He told GB News: “I know that this inquiry is going to dredge up a lot of bad memories for a lot of people, thinking about the people who I know didn’t make it out of the pandemic, and I know that there’ll be a lot of your viewers thinking the same thing right now.
“And I think this report is one way of looking at things. If you look very carefully at what the inquiry said yesterday, it suggested that if the country had locked down sooner in March 2020, lives would have been saved.”
He concluded: “But it also said that the scientific advice that was given to the Government at that point was telling the Government not to lock down earlier.
“And I’m not blaming the scientists, I’m just saying that this is an establishment of the facts as they were at the time.”