Does Boris Johnson really want to learn the lessons of coronavirus? The fact that he’s searching for scapegoats suggests not

Although several select committees are making an impact with their own investigations, an overarching review is needed, writes Andrew Grice

The instincts of Johnson’s advisers will be to keep any review under their own control (Reuters)

In his relaunch speech this week, Boris Johnson promised an honest discussion about the “plenty of things that people say and will say that we got wrong” on coronavirus.

He didn’t list the delayed lockdown, or the failures on personal protective equipment, testing, tracing and care homes. Instead, he asked the politicians’ favourite question: what did we get right?

However, behind the scenes, ministers’ minds are turning to the public inquiry they know they cannot put off forever. Johnson believes a full-scale investigation now would divert ministers and officials from the continuing battle with the virus. He has a point, as the Leicester lockdown and prospect of other local shutdowns show.

The prime minister promised to “learn the lessons”. But without an independent inquiry, this will be done on the hoof and on the government’s terms. Ministers will be judge and jury on their own performance; they are bound to protect their own backs and blame someone else.

The review of the disproportionately high impact on the Bame community does not inspire confidence. Its recommendations were initially filleted by the government, as the factors included “social and economic inequalities, racism, discrimination and stigma”.

We can see the first signs of Team Boris’s blame game in the ousting of Mark Sedwill, the cabinet secretary. By the time an inquiry comes, ministers will be able to say the civil service, in general, and Cabinet Office, in particular, is “under new leadership” after under-performing in the crisis. Lesson learnt, job done.

Public Health England (PHE) is also in ministers’ cross hairs and unlikely to survive in its present form as a semi-independent executive agency. It will be blamed for the fateful decision to abandon contact tracing in March. Ministers claim the Department for Health and Social Care has had to ride repeatedly to the rescue. They will doubtless present any shake-up as a big increase in the (now obviously inadequate) £3bn public health budget to protect the UK from future pandemics.

There is another side to this story. PHE was set up under Andrew Lansley’s NHS reforms during the Tory-led coalition. Although local authorities were also given responsibility for public health, their government funding for it has been cut by 22 per cent in the past five years, according to the Health Foundation think tank.

A proper review ensuring lessons are learnt is needed urgently because of the very real threat of a second wave in the cold of this winter. Not a root-and-branch inquiry lasting years – that can come later – but a short, sharply focused one taking a few months. It doesn’t have to be a backwards-looking blame game, but should be forward-looking, as the medical royal colleges have proposed. In an open letter to party leaders in the British Medical Journal, they called for “a transparent rapid review of where we are and what needs to be done to prevent and prepare for a second wave. We believe that such a review is crucial and needs to happen soon if the public is to have confidence that the virus can be contained.”

The Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group concedes that a full public inquiry would take years, but wants an immediate review “to ensure that lessons can be learned so that other families do not needlessly have to go through the pain we are experiencing”.

Ministers should drop their refusal to meet the group.

Although several select committees are making an impact with their own investigations, an overarching review is needed. Bernard Jenkin, who chairs the Liaison Committee of senior MPs, has discussed with the government “setting up a process that learns lessons” that would stop short of a “full-blooded inquiry”.

One model would be a joint commission of MPs and peers, like the one that shaped the government’s response to the banking crisis. Panels could look at specific issues, and call on outside experts.

Ministers will have to make their mind up soon. Rob Behrens, the health service ombudsman, has asked them for talks on “the structure and independence of the framework being considered for any review(s)”.

He said that while it was right for the nation to clap for carers, it is vital to begin learning from any mistakes made in the handling of the crisis.

The instincts of Johnson’s advisers will be to keep any review under their own control, or at least ensure it is headed by a sympathetic chair. That would lack credibility and dilute its effectiveness.

If Johnson really wants to learn lessons rather than search for scapegoats outside his immediate circle, he should set up an independent review to report in three months. It could make the difference between preventing a second wave and not.