Dominic Cummings Leaks WhatsApp Exchange Suggesting Boris Johnson Called Matt Hancock ‘Totally f****** Hopeless’
Boris Johnson has vowed to maintain Matt Hancock as health secretary notwithstanding the release of messages apparently displaying that he branded him “totally f****** hopeless” at the peak of the first wave of coronavirus last spring.
The brutal putdown was covered in screenshots of WhatsApp exchanges published by former No 10 adviser Dominic Cummings as he fought back towards government tries to undermine his account of disarray in Downing Street and the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC) as Covid-19 swept throughout the UK.
Mr Cummings accused the PM and Mr Hancock of attempting to “rewrite history” to cowl up their preliminary “herd immunity” strategy and their failings on the provision of private defensive equipment (PPE), the protection of care homes and the introduction of testing in the spring of 2020.
And he accused Mr Johnson of delaying a public inquiry into the government’s performance for long enough to make sure its potentially damning findings are launched after his private target date to resign as PM in 2025 or 2026.
Downing Street disregarded recommendations that the PM is planning to resign within two years of the next election.
‘I don’t think I’m hopeless’, says Matt Hancock
But sources did not deny the authenticity of the documents posted via Mr Cummings.
And Mr Hancock himself stated in simple terms “I don’t think so” when he was asked by a reporter if it was true that he was “hopeless”.