Boris Johnson’s reluctant admission that there are “many things” he should have done differently is why we deserve an immediate public inquiry into the Government’s handling of the pandemic.
The Prime Minister wants to delay – a trademark of the man whose slow responses to the crisis cost us tens of thousands of lives.
The PM may calculate that putting off the inquiry will, combined with the hugely successful NHS vaccination programme,
inoculate him against responsibility.
But Labour leader Keir Starmer’s calls for an inquiry are a legitimate attempt to uncover the truth behind key, often disastrous, decisions and stop the same happening again.
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Most of us want to look forward, but we owe it to the dead and bereaved to discover why far more lives and livelihoods were lost in Britain than comparable countries.
We need that inquiry. Now.
Justice for 24
The overturned convictions of 14 of the Shrewsbury 24 pickets from the 1972 builders’ strike are a tribute to the tenacity of men who refused to be beaten.
Verdicts against others in the group may now also be quashed after the Court of Appeal ruling that destruction of witness statements made the convictions unsafe.
Yet serious questions remain about why and how the workers were prosecuted. Their claim of political abuse requires answers.
The Government could start by releasing all files surrounding the cases, including any involving the then-PM and Home Secretary. Excuses about national security won’t wash.
The Shrewsbury 24 deserve justice.
Hull of a task
A proud Yorkshireman with cerebral palsy understandably wants a local accent to replace the American twang of his computer generated voice.
How would an American like it if, instead of coming across like a New Yorker or a Texan, they sounded as if thee wor fra ’Ull?
