Boris Johnson’s former spin chief blames ‘bad
policy’ for UK coronavirus deaths
Lee Cain tells POLITICO’s Westminster Insider podcast:
‘You can’t make good comms of bad policy.’
Turmoil Inside Number 10 As Senior Adviser Leaves
Compromises were made 'too often', says Lee Cain,
former director of communications to Boris Johnson |
BY JACK
BLANCHARD
October 1,
2021 4:00 am
LONDON —
Boris Johnson's former Downing Street spin doctor has defended the U.K.
government's pandemic communications and blamed "bad policy" for
failings which left more than 130,000 people dead.
In an
extended interview with POLITICO's Westminster Insider podcast, Lee Cain said
he was "proud" of the U.K. government's COVID PR campaigns, and
blamed mixed messaging on politicians struggling to "make policy in real
time" to combat a virus "we didn't really understand."
Cain spent
16 months as Downing Street's director of communications following Johnson's
appointment as prime minister in 2019, putting him in charge of U.K. government
messaging when the pandemic struck the following spring. Cain subsequently left
government in November 2020, and now runs his own strategic advisory firm.
"You
can't make good comms of bad policy," Cain told the podcast, as he
reflected on the early stages of the pandemic. "And I think one of the
challenges early on is we were making policy in real time. We didn't really
understand the virus, and we were making decisions that were transforming people's
lives … Can you go to work? Can you go to school? ... These are fundamental
freedoms that we were slowly rolling back … And I think people really, really
underestimate the challenge of that.
"So
from a comms perspective, I was often in the room with the PM trying to get the
policy in the right place, so that we could communicate something that was
sensible. And I think in some of those early stages, the policy just wasn't in
the right place. I think people were too often trying to make compromises. "
Numerous
scientists have criticized the U.K.'s failure to lock down at an earlier stage
of the pandemic, suggesting stricter controls in early or mid-March 2020 would
have saved tens of thousands of lives. Boris Johnson did not order a full
lockdown until March 23.
A public
inquiry into the government's handling of the pandemic is due to start in
spring 2022. Earlier this week, Johnson promised bereaved families he would
appoint a chair to run the investigation by Christmas.
Cain
recalls a "long conversation" in the Cabinet room in Downing Street
early in March 2020, about whether to close the nation's pubs to reduce social
mixing.
"All
the sort of key people [were] saying 'we should close the pubs,'" Cain
said. "But then there was a sort of pushback from those with economic
interests, saying, actually, this is a huge industry — all these jobs will be
lost. We'd need a whole scheme to support the industry.
"And
we ended up with this compromise space of, 'well, let's leave the pubs open,
but tell people not to go.' The communicators in the room were very forthright
in saying: 'This is obviously not going to hold up. As soon as it hits the
media, this will be pulled apart. And we're best just closing the pubs now.'
But that's not where we ended up. And I think that's just one of those examples
of poor policy."
Cain also
accepted Johnson's own media appearances did not always help matters, noting
the infamous March 3 press conference where the PM boasted of shaking hands
with "everybody" on a hospital coronavirus ward.
"That
wasn't on the official briefing document, it's safe to say," Cain said
with a grimace. "But people do make mistakes on this sort of stuff and I'm
sure the prime minister, if he could go back to the start of that, wouldn't say
the same thing again."
Cain said
that by contrast, the "Stay Home, Save Lives, Protect the NHS"
campaign dreamed up by his PR team in No. 10 had been highly effective, and
that holding nightly televised press conferences from Downing Street had been
essential to keeping the public informed.
"That,
for me, was the most important step we took during the crisis," he said.
"We had huge numbers of people watching, 10 million a day, everybody
tuning in — it became a sort of focal point of lockdown. And being able to get
those core messages about what people needed to do, how things were developing,
and going straight to individuals in their home, was totally game-changing and
showed real government grip."
Unlike his
close friend Dominic Cummings, whom he worked alongside in Downing Street, Cain
refused to criticize Johnson directly for a pandemic response which has left
Britain with the worst COVID death rate in the whole of western Europe.
"The
right decisions were always made," Cain said. "Sometimes maybe we
could have gone a bit earlier, potentially, but the right decisions were always
made. And I think it's only right the prime minister should be analyzing all
the other options and stress-testing that."
He added:
"Obviously, with the benefit of hindsight ... we'd probably all lock down
a week earlier. But again, the challenge with all of these things is just that
these are big decisions that you're making, in real time.
"He
[Johnson] was acutely aware of the devastation this could cause economically
... Obviously the first duty of any administration is to save lives. But you
also want to limit the economic pain that people are going to suffer."
Downing
Street declined to comment.
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário