Dumbarton MSP Jackie Baillie and inquiry judge Lady Hallett.

By Bill Heaney

MSP Jackie Baillie has blasted the Scottish and UK Governments for presiding over “endemic failings” after they were found lacking by Covid investigators.

The UK Covid Inquiry has found that both the Westminster and Holyrood governments “failed their citizens” and let the population down by not properly planning for the crisis.

Inquiry chairperson, Baroness Hallett, has now called for crucial reform of planning for public health emergencies.

She found that then First Minister Nicola Sturgeon’s government had followed flawed UK resilience plans, without adapting them to meet Scotland’s needs.

Ms Sturgeon had previously won praise over her handling of the pandemic.

Baroness Hallett described the UK as “ill-prepared for dealing with a catastrophic emergency, let alone the coronavirus pandemic” and noted that she had “no hesitation” in saying that civil contingency structures across the UK failed.

She added: “There were serious errors on the part of the state and serious flaws in our civil emergency systems. This cannot be allowed to happen again.”

She also said emergency planning proved too complex.

And she revealed that she feared the same could happen again if learning is not taken from the pandemic experience, saying:  “Unless the lessons are learned and fundamental change is implemented, the human and financial cost and sacrifice of the Covid -19 pandemic will have been in vain”.

The inquiry reported on whether the risk of a pandemic was properly identified and if the country was ready for it.

It found that:

• Ministers planned for a pandemic – but based most preparations on flu.
•  A UK-wide Influenza Pandemic Preparedness Strategy was “simply copied” by the Scottish Government without adaptation to local circumstances.
•  The Scottish government and other devolved administrations “did not act with sufficient urgency, or at all” on the findings of a previous planning exercise.
•   Parts of the Scottish government responsible for emergency planning were subject to a number of reorganisations, leaving them further from the centre of government and causing confusion.

Tellingly, it was also revealed that during a seven-month window in the year before Covid, Scottish Government officials tasked with preparing for a pandemic did not meet at all – because they were diverted to deal with Brexit.

A “lack of adequate leadership, coordination and oversight” across all UK Governments was identified, from the evidence heard by the inquiry.

The inquiry’s findings echo those of a 2021 Audit Scotland report that found the Scottish Government was not sufficiently prepared.

Baroness Hallett made a series of recommendations for a major overhaul of emergency planning, including the creation a new independent body to oversee the changes.

She also demanded a UK-wide pandemic planning exercise runs every three years.

It was made clear the inquiry expects recommendations to be implemented swiftly –  some of them within six months to a year.

The report is the first of several due from the inquiry, which began in 2022 and is scheduled to stage hearings until 2026.

Nicola Sturgeon, who led the Scottish Government between 2014 and 2023, told the inquiry last year that planning for a pandemic had been hampered by preparation for Brexit.

Ms Sturgeon agreed that the UK Influenza Pandemic Preparedness Strategy – produced in 2011 following the swine flu outbreak two years before – was inadequate to deal with Covid-19.

She also said her government clashed with Downing Street during the pandemic over approaches to suppressing the virus.

John Swinney told the inquiry that Brexit contributed to “pretty poor” working relations between the Scottish and UK governments.

A separate Scottish inquiry is examining the impact of the virus in Scotland.

It has been delayed after its original chair quit and four members of the legal team stood down.

Hearings began in October 2023 but they were further delayed after the replacement chair, Lord Brailsford, required surgery this year.

Dumbarton MSP and Scottish Labour’s Health spokesperson, Jackie Baillie, said: “During the pandemic people across Scotland were let down by two ill-prepared governments and the consequences were catastrophic.

“The SNP must respond to these damning findings and set out how it will address the serious shortcomings raised.

“All those in power at this time owe us complete transparency and honesty as this inquiry continues to seek the truth about what went so tragically wrong.

“For all the lives lost, livelihoods destroyed and sacrifices made, the lessons of the Covid pandemic must be learned so that the mistakes are never repeated.”

Top of page: Local children masked up at a party during the covid pandemic.