I managed to get along to a session of the Covid Inquiry last week.
I saw the Permanent Secretary of the Department of Health and the former Medical Director of Public Health England giving evidence.
I have to say that I felt a bit sorry for the Permanent Secretary. As head of the department responsible for the NHS, the questions were based on the idea that he is, well, an expert in health. Looking at his CV though, he spent nearly 20 years at the Department of Education, with additional spells at the Cabinet Office and Department for Communities & Local Government. His first involvement in health was his appointment as Permanent Secretary in 2016. Not surprisingly, he spent a lot of his time on the stand saying that things were not his area of expertise and offering to find "someone much more expert than me" to answer questions.
On a positive note, the use of technology to make the Inquiry process open to the public is impressive. You can watch live on YouTube and in the room, documents are brought up on screen and relevant passages highlighted for all to see and follow.
One thing really strikes you when you go into the Inquiry room though. There are a lot of lawyers involved in this process. According to The Economist, the questioning of witnesses will continue until at least 2026. In contrast, in many other countries they have already completed “short, sharp” investigations in order to draw lessons from Covid.
Is the Inquiry really the best way of learning what we need to learn from the pandemic?
There is a short answer to that. No.
Of course, learning isn’t really the point of the exercise. Holding people accountable, getting them onto the public stage and seeing how they respond to questions, is part of the democratic process.
If your objective is to find things out there is a lot to be said for focussed investigations which can be completed in months, rather than years.
There was always going to be a public inquiry around Covid, of course. But I hope that before people call for the next inquiry, they reflect on whether gathering a room of hundreds of lawyers to hear civil servants saying that they aren’t the right people to ask, is really a good use of time and money.
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