Matt Hancock is expected to lead a Downing Street press conference today in light of Dominic Cummings’ allegations.
Dominic Cummings was giving evidence to the Commons health and science committees on Wednesday where he made a series of bombshell claims about the government’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
Boris Johnson’s former aide claimed both he and the Cabinet Secretary told the Prime Minister that Mr Hancock should be sacked.
Mr Cummings says Matt Hancock "should have been fired for at least 15 to 20 different things, including lying to everybody on multiple occasions in meeting after meeting in the cabinet room and publicly".
He claims other senior officials in government agreed with his assessment.
Asked to provide evidence of the Health Secretary’s lying, the former chief aide to the Prime Minister told the Commons committee: “There are numerous examples. I mean in the summer he said that everybody who needed treatment got the treatment that they required.
“He knew that that was a lie because he had been briefed by the chief scientific adviser and the chief medical officer himself about the first peak, and we were told explicitly people did not get the treatment they deserved, many people were left to die in horrific circumstances.”
The Health Secretary will face MPs today over the allegations made by the former senior No 10 aide including that he lied to colleagues and performed “disastrously” during the Covid pandemic.
One Wednesday, Mr Hancock said that had not seen Mr Cummings’ seven-hour evidence to MPs as he was “saving lives” by dealing with the vaccination rollout.
He will answer a Commons urgent question and is due to lead a Government press conference, the day after a scathing attack by Mr Cummings who argued the Cabinet minister should have been sacked on 15 to 20 occasions.
As he arrived at his north London home on Wednesday evening, Mr Hancock said: “I haven’t seen this performance today in full, and instead I’ve been dealing with getting the vaccination rollout going, especially to over-30s, and saving lives.
“I’ll be giving a statement to the House of Commons tomorrow and I’ll have more to say then.”
MPs will question Mr Hancock on the claims, which included that Health Secretary indulged in “criminal, disgraceful behaviour” in producing a target of carrying out 100,000 tests per day for coronavirus in April 2020.
A spokesman for Mr Hancock said “we absolutely reject” the criticisms made by Mr Cummings.
Downing Street said on Wednesday Mr Hancock continued to have the confidence of the Prime Minister and the pair were “working closely” to save lives.
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