Covid inquiry live: Priti Patel admits policing of Sarah Everard vigil was ‘totally inappropriate’
Ex-home secretary says police generally struck right balance between protest and Covid restrictions
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Dame Priti Patel has admitted to the Covid inquiry that the policing of a vigil for murdered marketing executive Sarah Everard was “totally inappropriate”.
The former home secretary said she was “dismayed” by the policing of the vigil in early 2021. The Metropolitan Police have since apologised and paid damages to two of those who were arrested.
However, Dame Priti said she felt the police generally struck the right balance between enforcing coronavirus restrictions and upholding people’s right to protest – despite such matters feeling “uncomfortable” at the time.
Earlier today, former top police chief Martin Hewitt criticised localised Covid rules, the speed at which they changed, and the tier system of different regulations for different areas of the country.
He told the inquiry that localised tiers made it “incredibly difficult for even a perfectly law-abiding and committed citizen to understand precisely what that meant for them in their own personal circumstances”, while having different regulations “on opposite sides of the same road” made policing more difficult.
Jun Pang, the policy and campaigns officer at Liberty, is also giving evidence to the inquiry.
Police delayed law after getting Matt Hancock’s sign off just minutes before midnight
Police had to put off enforcing new coronavirus laws because they only received the legislation signed off by Matt Hancock 16 minutes before it was meant to be enforced, the Covid inquiry has heard.
Martin Hewitt, said he had to tell then-home secretary Dame Priti Patel officers would need more time to act.
Mr Hewitt, who coordinated the coronavirus response between all the UK’s forces, also criticised ministers for confusing the situation further during media appearances.
On one night, he said there was regulation intended to come into force at 12.01am but “we received the regulations signed off by the secretary of state for health and social care (Mr Hancock) at 11.45”.
“So we had precisely 16 minutes,” he said, despite briefing documents needing to be drawn up and then translated into Welsh before they could be shared with forces.
“I had a conversation and was very clear with the home secretary at the time (Dame Priti) that we would not be enforcing that regulation on that day and it was going to take us probably ... 24/36 hours to actually get to a place where I was confident police officers out there knew what they needed to do.”
More problems would arise at 7am the following morning when ministers were “spinning round” the television and radio studios would be talking about this, he said.
Mr Hewitt said politicians would on “many occasions” go on to “throw a whole degree of confusion out” by mixing up regulation and laws, so he would have to correct the record.
I had ‘very strong words’ with the government over how to police protests in the pandemic - Hewitt
The top police chief during the pandemic had “very strong words” with the government over how to police protests at the time, the UK Covid-19 Inquiry has heard.
Martin Hewitt, the former chairman of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, said protests presented a “great challenge” for forces.
“There was a confusion around which of the competing legislations took priority,” he said.
“It’s important for people to understand how that felt for police officers when we are in a pandemic where we are talking about the requirement for people to remain distanced, and then are being told to go and police a protest.
“I used very strong words behind closed doors in discussion with the Home Office and the Home Secretary at the time in relation to the situation.”
He added that the safety of officers and protesters was a key consideration.
Martin Hewitt critical of localised Covid rules
Former top police chief Martin Hewitt criticised localised Covid rules and the the speed at which they changed.
The former National Police Chiefs’ Council chairman told the inquiry: “Once it started to change and then once it was really changing quite rapidly and you were getting tiers and you were getting localised, it became incredibly difficult for even a perfectly law-abiding and committed citizen to understand precisely what that meant for them in their own personal circumstances.”
Having different regulations “on opposite sides of the same road” made policing more difficult, he said.
He also said people becoming “fed up with the regulations” had the effect of sapping “away at the morale of the officers who are just trying to do their job in pretty difficult circumstances”.
People travelling to beauty spots as lockdown regulations differed put pressure on policing - Martin Hewitt
Divergence in regulations in different parts of the UK and people travelling to beauty spots put pressure on policing, ex-National Police Chiefs’ Council chairman Martin Hewitt told the official inquiry into the pandemic.
He said people were “travelling in some cases hundreds of miles” to go to beautiful parts of the UK, making locals “quite angry” about “lots of people from other parts of the country coming into those communities when they are they are abiding by all the rules”.
“People’s preparedness to comply is eroded when I think that the other person over there is having an easier time than me.
“And this particularly became relevant when we started to get local lockdowns and and in some places where you would have literally on opposite sides of the road different regulations for people.
“But I think that became quite a feature if you talk about those beauty spot areas where people were saying ‘we are doing this, we are not moving, we are staying local, and these people are coming in and potentially putting us at risk’.
“And that puts a pressure on policing.”
Martin Hewitt: Policing during the pandemic was in uncharted territory
Policing during the pandemic was “largely uncharted territory” for forces in terms of trying to achieve compliance with the regulations, the former chairman of the National Police Chiefs’ Council has said.
Giving evidence to the UK Covid-19 Inquiry today, Martin Hewitt said that the response “was going to clash with our normal way of operating as the police service in this country.
“Looking at the other countries where the virus had spread ahead of this country, you could see the kind of measures that were being taken were measures that, as far as I’m aware, in policing terms, nothing like that had happened since the Second World War.
“So we were going to be into positions where we were going to be imposing on people’s liberty and movement and their lives in a way that was totally out of our experience at that point in time.”
Having to consider whether officers or the public had the coronavirus was another new dimension to operations, he said.
Martin Hewitt, the former chair of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, is up first this morning
Good morning
Good morning and welcome to the blog covering the Covid-19 inquiry.
Former Home Secretary Priti Patel is preparing to give evidence at the Covid inquiry, as is Martin Hewitt, the former chair of the National Police Chiefs’ Council and Jun Pang, the policy and campaigns officer at Liberty.
That’s us wrapping up our liveblog coverage today, thanks for following here.
You can find our latest output on the Covid inquiry here, or else keep scrolling to catch up on the day’s events as we reported them:
Full report: Johnson was told to sack Hancock to ‘save lives and protect the NHS’, Covid inquiry told
Britain’s top civil servant told Boris Johnson to sack Matt Hancock as health secretary to “save lives and protect the NHS”, the Covid inquiry has heard.
Former cabinet secretary Mark Sedwill said he made the suggestion as a joke in a WhatsApp message to then No10 permanent secretary Simon Case, confirming the exchange on Wednesday.
Lord Sedwill said he was using “gallows humour”, but confirmed he had a conversation with Mr Johnson about the need to get rid of Mr Hancock – who was seen by many officials through the pandemic as dishonest.
Our political correspondent Archie Mitchell has the full report here:
Sedwill compred shielding to ‘Stalinist segmentation'
Former cabinet secretary Lord Mark Sedwill compared shielding to "Stalinist segmentation" in messages to then No 10 permanent secretary Simon Case.
In a message from July 16 2020 shown to the Covid Inquiry, Lord Sedwill wrote: "The only answer I can see beyond the existing mitigations (other than the fantasy app) is Stalinist segmentation.
"The virus kills the old and sick. The lockdown hits the young and healthy. We have to confront the brutal truth and organise for it, notwithstanding CW’s scepticism about the practicalities."
Later on July 30, Lord Sedwill suggested in a message to Mr Case he did not buy the argument of Sage scientists that "it’s all too difficult" when it came to segregation.
Mr Case replied: "Neither PM (Boris Johnson) nor CX (Rishi Sunak) buy SAGE argument either."
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