Delayed action before 2020 Christmas lockdown 'inexcusable'

The circumstances which led to the Welsh government's decision to impose a Christmas 2020 Covid lockdown across Wales were "inexcusable", says the chair of the UK public inquiry into the pandemic.

Baroness Hallet said Welsh ministers had failed to take "decisive action" against an "entirely foreseeable" Covid variant resulting in the lockdown.

Prior to the lockdown, she said ministers had relaxed measures "more quickly than scientists advised". Parts of England also went into lockdown at the same time as Wales.

First Minister Eluned Morgan said the government would take time to read the report and consider and act on its recommendations.

Hallet made the comment in a video statement following the inquiry's publication of its second report which considered the response of all four governments across the UK to the pandemic.

The report said the Welsh government's initial response to Covid was "inadequate", with ministers in Cardiff "overly reliant" on the UK government to take the lead.

First minister Eluned Morgan welcomed the report and said the Welsh government "was committed to learning lessons from the pandemic" and would work with the other UK governments over the coming months.

"It is important that we remember the immense loss and suffering of so many people due to Covid-19. Today, our thoughts must first and foremost be with them," she added.

Former first minister Mark Drakeford defended the government's handling of the pandemic, saying it "acted in the best way that we were able".

In a new video statement, Baroness Hallet said from August to December 2020, Wales had the "highest age standardised mortality rate of the four nations".

"It's likely that this was a result of a combination of failed local restrictions, a firebreak lockdown that was imposed too late despite exponential growth of the virus, and the decision to relax measures more quickly than scientists advised."

She said that by late 2020 Wales, as well as the rest of the UK, "failed to take decisive action in response to the entirely foreseeable Alpha variant".

"Instead, it pressed on with plans for relaxing measures over Christmas, while cases grew rapidly, only to change course on the 19 December, when levels of infection became critical," she said.

Baroness Hallett added that the "mistakes" of February and March 2020 were repeated and "a return to lockdown had once again become unavoidable".

"That was inexcusable."

Originally the Welsh government had planned to relax rules from 23 to 27 December 2020 to allow people to celebrate with loved-ones but these were scrapped on 19 December 2020 with meeting up limited to Christmas Day.

In announcing the measures, which meant people had to stay at home and only go out for essential reasons, Drakeford said hundreds of people had contracted a new, "more aggressive" variant of the virus in Wales.

Similar measures had also been introduced by the then Prime Minister Boris Johnson in parts of England.