What happened to England’s top nurse after she refused to back lockdown bandit Cummings
The story that won’t go away
Even though it is getting on for two months since the Cummings lockdown breaking drive to Durham first made the headlines the story has re-emerged this afternoon with the appearance of England’s Chief Nurse, Ruth May, before the Commons public accounts committee.
According to reports of this afternoon’s session there had been a trial run for her participation in the televised news conference in which she was asked about what Cummings did and she did not give him her backing. Later she was told she was no longer needed for the press conference. She said “It is indeed true I was dropped from the briefing but that happened to many of my colleagues as well”.
All this does, of course, is put the actions of Cummings back on the agenda and raises questions about how the government has been using the briefings. The need not to embarrass the PM appears to have taken priority over everything.
No doubt Keir Starmer has made notes to raise this at a suitable moment in the future.