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Dominic Cummings brands Boris Johnson ‘unfit for the job’ and says ‘tens of thousands died who didn’t need to’
VENGEFUL Dominic Cummings savaged Boris Johnson today in a jaw-dropping Commons tirade — telling a Covid inquiry the PM was unfit for office and claiming his dithering killed thousands.
The former aide also admitted not telling the whole truth about his infamous trip to Durham, where he claimed he broke lockdown rules to test his eyesight.
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But some accused Mr Cummings of seeking revenge over his No10 ousting. Last night a former colleague branded him a “disingenuous little f*****”.
Mr Cummings lifted the lid on pandemic chaos at the heart of No10 last year, alleging “there wasn’t even a plan to bury all the bodies”.
He savaged Health Secretary Matt Hancock, who he claimed should have been sacked for lying to the PM that the elderly would be tested before they were released from hospitals into care homes in the early days of the virus.
In a grovelling apology for his own failings, including the Barnard Castle affair, the ousted Downing Street adviser said Britain was “let down” as the country was blindsided by the virus and crippled by inaction.
Mr Cummings spoke out to MPs during an astonishing seven-hour evidence session.
Last night, both Mr Johnson and Mr Hancock rejected Mr Cummings’ version of events as Westminster reeled from the unprecedented broadside.
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The PM said: “I am absolutely confident that we took the decisions in the best interests of the British people.”
A spokesman for Mr Hancock rejected claims made against the Health Secretary, saying that he and his department have “worked incredibly hard in unprecedented circumstances to protect the NHS and save lives”.
Mr Cummings was forced out late last year in a power struggle with Mr Johnson’s fiancee Carrie Symonds.
I am absolutely confident that we took the decisions in the best interests of the British people.
Boris Johnson
Yesterday, he spoke of the PM’s lockdown scepticism, planning chaos, internal fights and paralysis — claiming the country was let down as “lions were led by donkeys again and again”.
He told a Commons committee: “When the public needed us most, the Government failed.”
Mr Cummings claimed the PM was far too slow to lock down and that Cabinet Secretary Mark Sedwill was suggesting as late as March 13 last year Mr Johnson go on telly to urge the public to have “chicken pox parties” to spread Covid and build up immunity.
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Cummings on Boris: 'Changes his mind 10 times a day'
By Harry Cole and Natasha Clark
BRITAIN was failed by the choice between Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn as PM in the last election, Dominic Cummings said yesterday.
The ex-aide lashed his old boss, saying Mr Johnson is “fundamentally unfit for the job” and thousands of others could do better.
He said that the PM “changes his mind ten times a day”, was a “thousand times too obsessed with the media” and cared more about making headlines than making tough decisions.
He also revealed Mr Johnson had wanted chief medical officer Chris Whitty to inject him with coronavirus on live TV to prove it was nothing to worry about — believing it was similar to swine flu.
Mr Cummings also told yesterday’s committee hearing: “It’s just completely crackers that someone like me should have been in there, just the same as it’s crackers that Boris Johnson was in there, and that the choice at the last election was Jeremy Corbyn.”
And he insisted the PM did say he’d rather see “bodies pile high” than order another lockdown.
Mr Cummings said Mr Johnson dismissed Covid as a scare story and presided over a government of chaos — even revelling in it.
He claimed he told his then-boss during a conversation about his departure: “This whole system is chaos, this whole building is chaos but you are more frightened of me having the power to stop the chaos than the chaos itself.
“He laughed and said, ‘You’re right, I am more frightened of you having the power to stop the chaos, chaos isn’t that bad, chaos means that everyone has to look to me to see who’s in charge’.”
Asked if he thought Mr Johnson was a “fit and proper person to get us through the pandemic”, Mr Cummings replied bluntly: “No.”
He alleged Mr Johnson made the same mistake by not locking down early enough last autumn, resulting in thousands more needless deaths.
And reigniting his war with Ms Symonds, Mr Cummings claimed the PM was distracted in early 2020 as the virus threat grew by his private life and it was “crackers” Mr Johnson was even running the country.
'LET THE BODIES PILE HIGH'
In a blistering assault, he accused the PM of being on holiday and claimed “lots of key people were literally skiing” as Covid lapped at Britain’s shores.
Insisting he heard Mr Johnson’s infamous “let the bodies pile high” comment, Mr Cummings rounded on ministers, advisers and the civil service as he gave a blow-by-blow account of last March’s disaster — claiming there was “overall total system failure”.
Branding the Cabinet Office “terrifyingly awful”, he revealed that a Civil Service boss had confessed at the height of panic: “I’ve been told for years there is a plan — there is no plan; we are in huge trouble. I think we are absolutely f***ed.”
He claimed Helen McNamara, the deputy Cabinet Secretary, came to the PM’s study where Mr Cummings was looking at his lockdown plans in mid-March and warned: “I think this country is heading for a disaster, we are going to kill thousands of people.”
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Cummings on Hancock: 'Health Sec should've been fired'
By Kate Ferguson
MATT Hancock sent thousands of frail Brits to their deaths by allowing Covid to get into care homes — and then lied about it, Dominic Cummings claimed.
He said the Health Secretary should have been fired 15 or 20 times over a string of failures.
Mr Hancock was guilty of “criminal, disgraceful behaviour” for his errors over test and trace and PPE, the rogue ex-aide fumed.
Grim official stats show 42,341 care-home residents in England and Wales died because of Covid.
The former aide said Boris Johnson was on the brink of firing Mr Hancock in April last year — a claim Downing Street did not deny.
But the PM did not go through with it as other aides advised him that Mr Hancock would be useful as a fall guy later on.
Mr Cummings said: “I said sack him almost every week, sometimes almost every day. He was told, though, you should keep him there, because he’s the person you fire when the inquiry comes along.”
He said the Health Secretary promised in the Cabinet room that all hospital patients discharged back into care homes would be tested — but they were not.
Mr Cummings said he and the PM discovered the truth only in April last year.
He added: “Now all the Government rhetoric of ‘we put a shield around care homes’ and blah blah, was complete nonsense.
“Quite the opposite of putting a shield around them, we sent people with Covid back to care homes.”
Last night Mr Hancock said he had not seen Mr Cummings’ evidence, “and instead I’ve been dealing with getting the vaccination rollout going, and saving lives”.
But earlier, his spokesman had said: “We absolutely reject Mr Cummings’ claims.”
And he revealed: “The core of the Government collapsed when the Prime Minister got ill himself . . . people thought he might die.”
Mr Johnson was in hospital for a week in April last year — including a spell in intensive care.
Mr Cummings said the PM made “some very bad misjudgments and got some very serious things wrong”.
He explained that by the end of October last year, his relationship with Mr Johnson had deteriorated to the extent that “fundamentally, I regarded him as unfit for the job and I was trying to create a structure around him to try and stop what I thought were extremely bad decisions”.
He added: “If you took anybody at random from the top one per cent competent people in this country and presented them with the situation, they would have behaved differently to how the Prime Minister behaved.”
But the Brexit architect saved most of his vitriol for Mr Hancock.
He said: “I think the Secretary of State for Health should’ve been fired for at least 15, 20 things, including lying to everybody on multiple occasions in meeting after meeting in the Cabinet room and publicly.
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“There's no doubt at all that many senior people performed far, far disastrously below the standards which the country has a right to expect.
“I think the Secretary of State for Health is certainly one of those people.
“I said repeatedly to the Prime Minister that he should be fired, so did the Cabinet Secretary, so did many other senior people.”
Mr Cummings said the planned public inquiry into Covid, due to start in spring next year, was too late.
He added: “Tens of thousands of people died who didn’t need to die.
“There is absolutely no excuse for delaying that because a lot of the reasons for why that happened are still in place now.”
Tens of thousands of people died who didn’t need to die.
Dominic Cummings
Midway through Mr Cummings’ evidence session, Mr Johnson appeared in the Commons.
He told MPs: “I don’t think anybody could credibly accuse this Government of being complacent about the threat this virus posed at any point.”
The PM added: “I take full responsibility for everything that has happened.
“I am truly sorry for the suffering the people of this country have experienced.
“But the Government acted throughout with the intention to save lives, protect the NHS and in accordance with the best scientific advice.”
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Mr Hancock — who went for a run before Mr Cummings gave evidence — is expected to face MPs today and will hit back at a press conference.
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Last night, a former No10 colleague of Mr Cummings called him a “disingenuous little f***”.
The source added: “I have never seen such a squirming nest of vicious contradiction embodied in a single individual.”
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