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Hancock: Scotland should focus on ‘fat-fighting’ and let Westminster handle Covid

WhatsApp messages reveal tension between UK government and Scottish government over pandemic response

By Ruby Lott-Lavigna
Hancock: Scotland should focus on ‘fat-fighting’ and let Westminster handle Covid
Matt Hancock claimed the Covid response was not part of Scotland’s devolution agreement | Carl Court/Getty Images
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Matt Hancock claimed the Scottish government should stick to “fat fighting” and leave “public health emergencies” to ministers in Westminster in a WhatsApp exchange on Covid.

Texts sent between Hancock and Michael Gove in May 2020 reveal that the then health secretary was resistant to allowing a “four nations” approach to the Joint Biosecurity Centre, an organisation created to provide objective advice on the pandemic.

The messages, which reveal tensions between the UK government and the Scottish government, were shown during Gove’s appearance at the Covid inquiry, which is currently taking place in Edinburgh.

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Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0