Matt Hancock texts: The most explosive messages from 100,000 leaked WhatApps

The then-health secretary Matt Hancock gestures during a tour of Chelsea and Westminster hospital on 17 June, 2021. (Reuters)

More than 100,000 explosive WhatsApp messages sent during the height of COVID have been leaked, shedding new light on the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Former health secretary Matt Hancock shared thousands of messages with journalist Isabel Oakeshott, the ghost writer of his book, who later shared them with The Telegraph.

Oakeshoot tweeted that the messages were “the biggest leak of data involving the government since the 2009 MPs’ expenses scandal, shedding new light on issues including care home deaths, lockdowns, testing, school closures and face masks. We all deserve to know.”

The files allegedly detail everything from Hancock’s reluctance to test all patients entering nursing homes to his decision to send a COVID test to the home of then-cabinet minister Jacob Rees-Mogg amid a nationwide testing shortage.

Yahoo News sums up the most explosive messages:

Hancock rejected advice to test all care home patients

Hancock was told by chief medical officer Sir Chris Whitty that COVID testing should be given for “all going into care homes”, the leaked messages reveal.

However, while Hancock responded that this was “obviously a good positive step” he later messaged an aide: “Tell me if I’m wrong but I would rather leave it out and just commit to test & isolate ALL going into care from hospital. I do not think the community commitment adds anything and it muddies the waters.”

At the time, Hancock told the public he had put a “protective ring” around care homes, and has faced a huge backlash from the families of care home residents over the messages.

More than 45,000 people in care homes died of COVID during the pandemic, of whom 17,678 died between April and August 2020 – when mandatory testing for those entering care homes from the community was introduced.

In statement following the WhatsApp leak, a spokesperson for Hancock said an issue with test availability prompted the decision. “Matt concluded that the testing of people leaving hospital for care homes should be prioritised because of the higher risks of transmission, as it wasn’t possible to mandate everyone going into care homes got tested,” the statement said.

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Hancock has also claimed the COVID care home texts had been “spun to fit an anti-lockdown agenda”.

Read more: Hancock claims texts showing he ignored Covid care home advice were ‘doctored’ (The Independent, 6-min read)

Jacob Rees-Mogg’s child got priority COVID test

The messages also reveal that one of Rees-Mogg’s children got a prioritised COVID test.

“The lab lost JRM’s child’s test, so we’ve got a courier going to their family home tonight, child will take the test, and courier will take it straight to the lab. Should have result tomorrow AM,” one message between Hancock and special adviser Allan Nixon read.

“Jacob’s spad [special adviser] is aware and has helped line it all up, but you might want to text Jacob,” the leaked message added.

Jacob Rees-Mogg’s child received a priority COVID test, according to the WhatsApp messages. (Reuters)

The priority test offered to then-cabinet member Rees-Mogg came amid a nationwide backlog of 145,000 tests that were awaiting processing.

Many people, some of whom would have lost pay due to being unable to work, were forced to isolate for up to a week while waiting for their tests to be returned. Discussing the test delivery in parliament, Liberal Democrat MP Daisy Cooper said: “This is yet more evidence that it’s one rule for Conservative ministers and another for everyone else”.

Boris said ‘I am going quietly crackers’ over testing

The messages show then-prime minister Boris Johnson was frustrated about testing.

Johnson texted Hancock: “It’s all about testing. That’s our Achilles’ heel. We can’t deliver a sensible border policy or adequate track and trace because we can’t test enough. Did we go to the Germans for those kits that Angela Merkel was offering? What is wrong with us as a country that we can’t fix this?”

“We have had months and months,” he added. “I am going quietly crackers about this.”

Then PM Boris Johnson said he was going ‘quietly crackers’ over testing. (Reuters)

Hancock replied to Johnson: “Don’t go crackers. We have test capacity enough to do this. We now have the biggest testing capacity in Europe. The problem is the false negatives – so the medics are against releasing from self-isolation (whether for quarantine or T&T) with a negative test.”

The UK experienced a number of issues with COVID testing, initially ordering faulty tests from China that did not give accurate readings, and later encountering problems with appointment booking for COVID tests and backlogs in providing test results.

Hancock ‘called in a favour’ from George Osborne

Hancock is also revealed to have ‘called in a favour’ from former colleague and ex-chancellor George Osborne.

“I need to call in a favour tmrw. I currently have 22,000 spare slots tomorrow at my drive thrus. Hence I’ve extended eligibility today,” the messages reveal Hancock texted Osborne, then editor of the Evening Standard.

“Demand just isn’t there. This is obvs good news about spread of virus. But hard for my target. So I really could do with a testing splash.”

Britain’s Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne speaks at a Remain in the EU campaign event at JP Morgan’s corporate centre in Bournemouth, southern Britain, June 3, 2016. REUTERS/Dylan Martinez/File Photo

Osborne responded that he could make a splash happen if Hancock would “give some exclusive words to the Standard”, to which Hancock later replied: “I WANT TO HIT MY TARGET!”

The ‘favour’ came as Hancock was struggling to meet his widely touted gold standard of 100,000 coronavirus tests per day, which texts also suggest he attempted to fudge to secure positive numbers.

Hancock told ‘no-one thinks testing is going well’

In later texts to the former chancellor, Hancock appears to have questioned why Osborne was critical of the government’s testing programme, asking: “What was this for?”

Osborne replied: “Trying to spread the responsibility from you to Number 10 – I’ve said it before”, to which Hancock said:”Ok but mass testing is going v well – I fear this looks like you asked for me to be overruled…”

Osborne messaged back: “No one thinks testing is going well. If I wanted a test today I can’t get one, unless I fake symptoms.”

Hancock told care home visit ban was ‘inhumane’

The then-health secretary was also told that banning care home visits was ‘inhumane’ by a minister.

In messages sent to Hancock, then-social care minister Helen Whately said: “I’m hearing there’s pressure to ban care home visiting in tier 2 as well as tier 3. Can you help? I really oppose that.

“Where care homes have COVID secure visiting we should be allowing it. To prevent husbands seeing wives because they happen to live in care homes for months and months is inhumane.”

Helen Whately texted Matt Hancock to say that banning care home visits was ‘inhumane’.

Many care homes across the country saw visitor restrictions for more than a year (from March 2020 until July 2021), meaning vulnerable residents were left isolated and alone in a bid to shield them from the virus.

Whately later asked Hancock about visiting rules in January 2021, to which he allegedly replied: “Yes on visiting but only after a few weeks.”

50-mile trip for Covid test shows system ‘working’

“Good news from my mystery shopping of our testing system – by repeat visits to testing app as advised have got test for XXXX (redacted) … just 50 miles from home,” Whately allegedly wrote after securing a COVID test on a 100-mile round trip.

She later added: “Negative result arrived for XXXX 24 hours after XXXX test, so my mystery shopping shows the system is definitely working, at least for some.”

“For MOST,” Hancock corrected her.

The messages were sent in September 2020 amid the testing backlog, with bottlenecks in testing laboratories seeing almost 200,000 people waiting for results. Of those, at least three quarters did not get their results in the suggested 24-hour post-test period, The Financial Times reported.

Shielding for vulnerable people was questioned

Chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance allegedly questioned shielding in August 2020, writing in a WhatsApp message that he didn’t think it was “easy or effective” for “extremely vulnerable” people to isolate, while Whitty said he would “think twice” about shielding himself.

Read more: Whitty and Vallance raised concerns about shielding – yet it remained for months (The Telegraph, 4-min read)

Despite these conversations, and one in which Johnson said he believed over-65s should have the choice about whether or not to shield, the advice for vulnerable people to isolate from others for protection remained in place.

Johnson messaged he believed the risk to over-65s from COVID was around the same as falling down stairs, The Telegraph reported. “And we don’t stop older people from using stairs,” he added.

Over 3.79 million clinically vulnerable people remained under shielding advice until April 2021.

Hancock said care home testing could affect target

In the leaked messages, Hancock appeared to worry that carrying out testing in care homes could have an impact on his prized 100,000 tests-per-day target.

In April 2020, amid a shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE) in care homes and as the virus was having a huge impact on vulnerable residents and staff, Hancock was told by a civil servant that he should “prioritise testing of asymptomatic staff and residents” in a care home suffering a COVID outbreak.

He replied: “OK” provided the testing did not “get in the way of actually fulfilling the capacity in testing”, however failed to provide a reason as to why this could affect his daily target.

The messages also suggested that as Hancock scrabbled to reach his self-imposed target he began counting tests that had been distributed but were unlikely to be returned in time.

What has Hancock said after texts released?

A spokesperson for Hancock said the published messages showed a “distorted account” of events.

In a statement, the spokesperson said: “It is outrageous that this distorted account of the pandemic is being pushed with partial leaks, spun to fit an anti-lockdown agenda, which would have cost hundreds of thousands of lives if followed. What the messages do show is a lot of people working hard to save lives.

“The full documents have already all been made available to the inquiry, which is the proper place for an objective assessment, so true lessons can be learned.”