"In office, Boris Johnson liked to see himself as a latter-day Winston Churchill. But the Covid report describing his toxic, chaotic and indecisive No 10 ought finally to put paid to any delusions that he had the qualities necessary to be a prime minister, let alone one guiding a country through a deadly national emergency. The claim among Johnson's supporters that he could make a political comeback also now looks increasingly dead in the water."
"Perhaps the most critical passage of the report is the confirmation that Johnson was at a government country retreat in Chevening House receiving no daily updates during half-term week of February 2020, while Covid was ripping through China, spreading in Italy and already confirmed as present in the UK. It does not appear that he was briefed, at all or to any significant extent, on Covid-19 and he received no daily updates, it found."
"The report may not reveal anything truly new about Johnson's character but the official conclusion that more lives could have been saved if not for a lost month of inaction in February 2020 is highly damaging for the former politician. In the words of the Covid-19 Bereaved Families group, it is devastating to think of the lives that could have been saved under a different prime minister."
Boris Johnson presented himself as a latter-day Winston Churchill while leading a No 10 described as toxic, chaotic and indecisive. Supporters’ hopes of a political comeback now look increasingly unlikely as opponents challenge his judgment on migration and other policies. An official finding concluded that a lost month of inaction in February 2020 cost lives. Johnson spent half-term week at Chevening House without daily COVID updates, received little or no briefing, and did not chair any Cobra emergency meetings that month. His optimistic personality and acceptance of assurances contributed to failures in the pandemic response, compounding damage from later scandals.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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