In partnership with

In your briefing today:

• Baroness Hallett has delivered her report on the UK’s governance through the Covid crisis: her findings are damning, especially of Boris Johnson and his government.

• Ofgem says the energy price cap will be lifted - confounding expectations, and putting all our bills up from January

• Families with children at a Scottish primary school are suing their council after a carbon monoxide leak produced scenes “like something from a zombie film”.

📣 “Too little, too late”: that was the verdict of former judge Baroness Hallett, delivering her long-awaited Covid Inquiry report into the governance of the UK during the Covid crisis. Her report is damning of the leadership of then Prime Minister Boris Johnson, and excoriating of the cast of figures who surrounded him.

• Their disfunction cost lives. Acting earlier could have prevented lockdown altogether, she suggests. By the time the situation had worsened, even locking down a week earlier would have saved 23,000 people in England and Wales alone - 48% fewer deaths in that first wave. (BBC)

• In Scotland, former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon comes in for some criticism around decision-making, her relationship with Boris Johnson and some of the claims she made in public. (Daily Mail)

• Sturgeon: I stand by decision to “lead from the front” (STV)

• Guardian: the key findings of the report

• Daily Record: Boris chaos during pandemic led to needless deaths of those we loved

• There is one dissenting voice in today’s coverage: David Frost, who served in Boris Johnson’s government, says Lady’s Hallett’s report should be “thrown aside with great force. In wearisome detail, and at the price of £192 million so far, it does nothing but reinforce the conventional wisdom.” (Telegraph £)

• More analysis and reaction later in today’s newsletter ⬇️

📣 The latest plan to end the war in Ukraine would see the country cede all of the eastern Donbas region, even though some of it remains in Ukrainian hands, as well as prevent the country joining Nato, and limit the future size of its armed forces.

As AP describes the proposal, which has emerged from negotiations between Moscow and Washington, it is “decidedly favourable to Russia”. (AP has the exclusive)

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he is ready for "honest work" with the US after receiving the draft peace plan (BBC)

📣 Energy prices will rise in January after the latest Ofgem price cap was released - this was contrary to expecations of a fall. Energy minister Michael Shanks said there was “no shortcut” to lower prices, even though wholesale prices are falling.

As Sky News points out, the UK has the second-highest domestic and the highest industrial electricity prices among developed nations, despite renewable sources providing more than 50% of UK electricity last year. (Sky News) (BBC)

Read newsletters, not spam

Tired of newsletters vanishing into Gmail’s promotion tab — or worse, being buried under ad spam?

Proton Mail keeps your subscriptions organized without tracking or filtering tricks. No hidden tabs. No data profiling. Just the content you signed up for, delivered where you can actually read it.

Built for privacy and clarity, Proton Mail is a better inbox for newsletter lovers and information seekers alike.

Newsletters without the noise

AROUND SCOTLAND

📣 Families are launching damages claims against East Dunbartonshire Council after a carbon monoxide leak at one of its primary schools. One parent recounted rushing to the school to find a scene “like something from a zombie film”, with youngsters vomiting, fainting and some lying on the floor asleep. (BBC)

📣 Veteran broadcaster Billy Sloan has delivered a “damning verdict” on the shakeup of BBC Radio Scotland that sees him lose his show. "I DON’T play the hits...the songs you keep hearing over and over again,” he posted on social media. Herald)

📣 One of Scotland’s most popular trad music bands has stunned its fans - and its lead singer - by announcing the frontman was leaving. (BBC)

AROUND THE UK & WORLD

📣 An unnamed star of Strictly Come Dancing has been arrested on suspicion of rape. Hertfordshire Police said the man, who was arrested last month, had been released on bail under investigation. (The Sun £) (BBC)

📣 The music world is mourning Gary “Mani” Mounfield, the Stone Roses and Primal Scream bassist who has died aged 63. The band issued a brief statement last night, paying tribute to “the greatest bass player and friend we could ever have wished for”. (Mirror - live coverage) (BBC)

• Liam Gallagher and Ian Brown lead tributes (Independent)

📣 Migrants may only be eligible for benefits and social housing once they become British citizens, under new plans announced by the home secretary. (Independent)

SPORT

⚽️ The future of Scotland manager Steve Clarke is unclear, despite him leading the country to its historic World Cup qualification earlier this week: the SFA will broach the subject with him after Christmas. (Scotsman)

⚽️ Celtic still haven’t asked Columbus Crew for permission to talk to their manager Wilfried Nancy, despite him being the red-hot favourite to take over at Celtic Park. (The Sun)

⚽️ Celtic’s AGM takes place today: it promises to be a fractuous affair. Former star Chris Sutton says the board has big questions to answer about its £80 million in the bank. (Daily Record)

IDEAS
How an incompetent government and Prime Minister led to the deaths of tens of thousands of Britons

🗣️ Baroness Hallett’s 760 pages of analysis set out, methodically and with a certain understatement, how the state failed its citizens, causing tens of thousands of them to die.

The undoubted villain of the piece is Boris Johnson, a Prime Minister hoplessly out of his depth based in a Downing Street operation that was utterly dysfunctional: “toxic and sexist,” in Hallett’s words, poisoned by the unelected advisor Dominic Cummings.

But the picture the report paints of governance shows, albeit with the benefit of hindsight, governance across the United Kingdom that struggled with the scale of the crisis, and of the need to make difficult decisions quickly, hampered by antiquated systems and a near-total lack of preparation.

“By the time Boris Johnson’s government realised just how much of a threat Covid-19 was, it was already too late,” opens The Times’s analysis of the report (£). “A combination of incompetence and over-optimism at the heart of the government meant warnings of a deadly virus from China were dismissed for weeks. Tens of thousands of Britons were doomed to die as a result.”

It may seem a slight punishment, but it will be final: Boris Johnson’s political career is finished now. “No prime minister in modern times has faced a charge so specific in its human cost, or so damning in its assessment of his flailing leadership,” The Times says in its leader (£). “Any suggestion that this self-styled jester of the British political scene could return as saviour of the Conservative Party is laid to rest.”

It was the delay at the start of the pandemic that was fatal to more than 20,000 people. The report paints a picture of the deeply unserious Johnson simply not paying much attention, describing February 2020 as a “lost month”. As the Guardian reports, “It questions why Johnson did not chair a single meeting of the Cobra emergency committee, noting also that the response to Covid essentially halted during the half-term holiday week.”

In the report’s words: “Mr Johnson should have appreciated sooner that this was an emergency that required prime ministerial leadership to inject urgency into the response.”

Nicola Sturgeon may have had a difficult time giving evidence to the inquiry last year, but her actions escaped serious criticism - certainly, relative to Johnson. Her government failed to plan for the virus, decision-making wasn’t done especially well, and she shouldn’t have claimed the virus could be eliminated.

But the First Minister was praised as a “serious and diligent” leader who “took responsibility” for her decisions, notes Paul Hutcheon.

The thing was, the devolved governments’ dependency on the UK government response left them compromised: the flailing Westminster and Whitehall departments lay at the heart of so much that went wrong.

It’s no exaggeration to say that tens of thousands of Britons paid with their lives. As the Independent puts it in a leader (£): “Now we know. We knew all along, of course, but now it’s confirmed. That Boris Johnson was unfit to lead the country. He should never have been prime minister.”

🗣️ The importance of the Covid Inquiry means the usual review of the weekly magazines is going to be truncated this week: their lead stories in brief:

• The New Statesman: Meet the bond market vigilantes - a long read on the changing relationship between the bond markets and politics.

• The Spectator: The upcoming budget has sewn months of confusion: it’s time to scrap the budget, and maybe even the Treasury, Tim Shipman argues.

• The Economist: Donald Trump is presiding over “anything goes America”, where rules are loosened and corruption tolerated. It sees a clampdown coming.

• The New World: The magazine goes to Kent, to examine six months “inside the catastrophic shambles of Nigel Farage’s flagship council”.

👍 That’s your Early Line for the day

Sent this by a friend?