Matt Hancock thought he should decide who lived and died if NHS became overwhelmed, Covid inquiry hears – UK politics live

by ClassicFlavour

23 comments

  1. Surely there’s established ethical guidelines for this sort of stuff?

  2. There seems to be a consistent theme throughout this inquiry that those in charge were, seemingly to a man, massively overfocused on the media rather than their actual job, while also having a pretty piss poor work-ethic, yet at the same time seem to view themselves so highly that they ought to be the ultimate arbitrators and deciders of all kinds of very serious decisions despite, again, when actually needing to put in the work on these decisions, showing again and again they just couldn’t be bothered if it didn’t mean getting more time in the media spotlight. I’ve been saying since the time but feel quite vindicated now in saying these people sound an awful lot like sociopaths.

  3. The young should live and the old should die.

    It’s the default and best choice in a catastophe.

  4. Hmmm a politician preposed that he should be deciding the fate of a person in a clinical capacity.

    I don’t think a single doctor would have even considered his plan if preposed given how criminal it would have been.

  6. The take so far from the enquiry this week is that Johnson’s government was populated by industrial strength bullshitters.

    Litteraly bullshited their way into the post, then doubled down when the shit hit the fan.

  7. Hold on, isn’t this just a natural consequence of how the UK constitution acts? He was Health Minister, and this is clearly a policy decision. Civil Service advices, Minister decides? The decision may be “Implement the guidelines recommended by the NHS or whoever” but this sounds like the Minister’s entire purpose for being.

  8. Emptying infectious patients into care homes was deciding some peoples fate.

  9. I get the impression that Hancock would have loved to work as an apparatchik in one of the totalitarian governments of the 1930s who spent his days deciding who should be sent to the labour camps and who should just be shot.

  10. Probably would’ve gone as well for the NHS and the populus as it did for Russia in World War 1 when Tsar Nicholas II took over their war effort

  11. I’d advise anyone with an interest in the Covid response or even how the government, civil service, NHS etc work in general to take time to watch as many of these evidence sessions as possible and not just read the headlines based on one or two sensational parts. It’s quite fascinating.

  12. Holy fuck.

    The BBC quasidocumentary “The War Game”‘ was not broadcast but shown in cinemas only because it contained material equally as abhorrent for example Plod shooting those deemed moribund.

    This veers scarily close to state imposed selection.

  13. Can’t wait to see his notepad….

    Live: Gina xx, my mate who runs the pub $$, me

    Dies: grannies

  14. The one thing that’s getting to me about this inquiry, is how unsurprising all of it is. There are accusations flying around that would destroy any mainstream politician 20 years ago, but now it’s just become so ordinary.

    “Newsflash! Those guys who have been running the country into the ground and bouncing from scandal to scandal for the last decade? Turns out they’re all morally vacuous and a bit stupid! WHO KNEW?!”

    How did it come to this?

  15. You don’t suppose we could let him be first to try out the dying part and let him get back to us about how it’s going?

  16. What an absolute douche-canoe.

    I’m a fairly confident guy and I’ve got zero issues with leadership, or taking responsibility… But I would dread being being put into a position where I was asked to decide if people lived or died.

    What kind of complete squishmitten not only wants that kind of responsibility, but also thinks that they should have it?

  17. Ah, you mean like how people decide if celebrities get to stay in a TV jungle?

  18. Truly delusions of grandeur… to the point Wanksock actually wanted to play God

  19. Does anyone have any advice on how to not descend into genuine misanthropy towards the people who voted for this government?

  20. You know the country was in the most dire of straits when the choice of who lived and who died fell into the hands of a conservative.

  21. There’s a lot of information coming out that warrants putting many of those in government behind bars for a very long time

  23. Am i the only one that isn’t bothered by discussions in a whatsapp group? Aren’t the Government supposed to discuss all possibilities before implementing anything?

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