Good morning. Matt Hancock, the health secretary, gave a long interview on a BBC Breakfast this morning and in it he gave his most considered response so far to the revelation last week that Boris Johnson called him “totally fucking hopeless” in a text to Dominic Cummings in March last year. Hancock put it down to the PM being stressed at the time. Asked how it felt to be described as “hopeless”, Hancock said:
Well, honestly, it feels like ancient history. The vaccine programme is a huge success. At times of stress people say all sorts of things in private. What matters is how well you work together.
And you’re referring to comments apparently from the prime minister. I work with the prime minister every single day. We work very strongly together, firstly to protect life, and secondly to get the country out of this.
When the presenter, Dan Walker, said that he had also once been described as being “hopeless” at a job (not presenting, but making cardboard boxes, when he was young), and that the revelation must have been embarrassing, Hancock replied:
No, it isn’t really because of all the things we’ve delivered together.
We’re here talking about the success of the vaccine programme. That is something that I’ve very much led from the department, working with the prime minister. He’s been a massive supporter of it throughout. And of course we’ve had obstacles, and we’ve had people that we’ve had to deal with on the way.
But what I can tell you is that the delivery of that programme has been absolutely fantastic, and if you look across other areas – whether protecting the NHS in the peak and dealing with this backlog now, or working on social care – we work incredibly closely together.
Hancock also refused to say whether he had Johnson had spoken about the text since it was revealed last week.
I will post more from the interview soon.
Here is the agenda for the day.
12pm: Downing Street is expected to hold its daily press conference.
12.30pm: Eluned Morgan, the Welsh government’s health minister, and Dr Chris Jones, deputy chief medical officer for Wales, are holding a press conference.
2pm: Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s former chief adviser, holds a Q&A on his Substack subscribers.
Dominic Cummings
(@Dominic2306)Experiment: ask me anything, 1400-1600 Monday UK time I’ll try to answer… https://t.co/4PQ2g18yvM
2.30pm: Sir Mark Worthington, the independent construction commissioner for HS2, and Sir John Armitt, chair of the national infrastructure commission, give evidence to the Commons public accounts committee on HS2.
After 3.30pm: MPs will debate a Labour motion on planning, saying the government should “protect the right of communities to object to individual planning applications”.
Johnson is also doing a visit today, where he is expected to record a broadcast interview.
Politics Live has been a mix of Covid and non-Covid news recently and that is likely to be the case today. For more coronavirus developments, do follow our global Covid live blog.
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