COVID inquiry hears former Civil Service head wanted Matt Hancock removed as health secretary in pandemic

Lord Sedwill was giving evidence to the COVID inquiry, and was asked for his views on the former health secretary.

Tim Baker

Political reporter

Wednesday 8 November 2023 19:46, UK

The former head of the Civil Service wanted Matt Hancock removed as health secretary in the pandemic, the COVID inquiry has heard.

Lord Sedwill, who was giving evidence on Wednesday to Lady Hallett's inquiry, was cabinet secretary and head of the civil service until September 2020.

Messages he exchanged with Simon Case - the current cabinet secretary - during the pandemic were shared with the hearing.

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Lord Sedwill told Mr Case that Mr Hancock needed to be removed to "save lives and protect the NHS" - a play on the pandemic-era slogan at the time.

He said this was "gallows humour".

But Lord Sedwill told the inquiry he did not use the word "sack" when speaking to the then prime minister Boris Johnson about Mr Hancock.

Mr Hancock has repeatedly come under fire from people giving evidence to the inquiry - many saying he overpromised and underdelivered when it came to the Department for Health and Social Care's capacity and preparedness for the pandemic.

Mr Johnson's former top aide, Dominic Cummings, said he purposefully excluded Mr Hancock from meetings because he could not be trusted.

Lord Sedwill said that, while he did not formally advise Mr Johnson to sack Mr Hancock, the then PM would have been "under no illusions' about his feelings.

Mr Johnson told the COVID inquiry previously: "I did not have any concerns regarding the performance of any Cabinet minister including Matt Hancock."

"I do not think that I received any advice from Sir Mark Sedwill that Matt should be removed."

Earlier in his evidence, Lord Sedwill said there had been wide-ranging concerns about Mr Hancock's honesty.

The inquiry's lawyer, Hugo Keith KC, said: "The process by which Mr Hancock's truthfulness, or candour, or lack of candour or general approach, however one describes it… was not an issue that was confined to perhaps one or two individuals, notably Mr Cummings…

"There was a general issue surrounding Mr Hancock, is that a fair summary?"

Lord Sedwill replied: "Yes and you heard from [former civil servant] Helen MacNamara on that last week."

A spokesperson for Matt Hancock said: "Mr Hancock has supported the inquiry throughout and will respond to all questions when he gives his evidence."

Mr Hancock resigned as health secretary in June 2021 after footage emerged of his embrace with aide Gina Coladangelo.

Sedwill's messages aren't expletive-filled - but they're still damaging

Amanda Akass

Political correspondent

Matt Hancock has been subject to vigorous criticism from many witnesses at the inquiry 鈥� particularly Dominic Cummings. But this afternoon we've had the extraordinary revelation that Lord Sedwill as head of the Civil Service advised the prime minister that he should be sacked in May 2020.

Messages exchanged between the cabinet secretary and the man who would become his successor, Simon Case, are pretty damning, including "the British system doesn't work if ministers lie" and "totally incompetent". It's not as coarse as Cummings' descriptions of him as a "c***" and a "proven liar" 鈥� but the message is the same.

Asked how damaging this loss of confidence in Hancock was for the functioning of government, Sedwill doesn't mince his words. "It was clearly damaging", he explains, describing the impact of questions about his lack of "candour, overpromising, overconfidence, over assurance".

Once again the former head of the Civil Service apologises for the language and comments he made in private conversations, acknowledging that "it was gallows humour, I recognise it was inappropriate even in a private exchange".

Instead of Hancock, however, it was Sedwill who ended up having to leave government, just months after these conversations. The health secretary was hoisted by his own petard a year later, after breaking COVID rules in kissing an aide and being caught on camera.

But Sedwill's overwhelming frustration with his Number 10 colleagues 鈥� and evident desire to leave 鈥� is clearly expressed in other messages exchanged with Case at the start of May, as they discuss whether Case would be willing to step in as his successor, and Case says he is not willing to work for Cummings.

Patrick Vallance, then the government's chief scientific adviser, noted in his diary that Sedwill described the administration as "brutal and useless".

A month later, Case messages Sedwill to say: "It is like taming wild animals. Nothing in my past experience has prepared me for this madness. The PM and the people he chooses to surround himself with are basically feral." Sedwill replies: "I've got the bite marks."

We've already had chapter and verse on the toxicity of the Johnson-Cummings Downing Street operation in the past few weeks of the inquiry 鈥� but for the two men who headed up the Civil Service during this period to describe their colleagues as feral is perhaps a new low.

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