Another 'anti-lockdown hero'
Grant Shapps is the latest cabinet minister to claim that he 'heroically' fought against SAGE over plans to lockdown the country. Shapps claims he had to do his own research and bring it to Cabinet meetings to counter the 'partial and skewed information being supplied by SAGE scientists' last Christmas.
Shapps, the Transport Secretary, told the Telegraph he made his own spreadsheets based on international data and sometimes presented his findings at Cabinet and Covid-O ministerial meetings to bolster resistance to further restrictions.
He said this proved effective in countering pressure for a potential lockdown last Christmas in response to the threat from the Omicron variant.
“I was able to present data based on three South African studies which wasn’t available from the standard SAGE presentation. In a close-run discussion, we didn’t lock down. The NHS wasn’t overrun,”
Shapps, who is supporting the former Chancellor [Rishi Sunak] in the leadership contest, said that at the start of the Covid crisis “there was of course no instruction manual for dealing with the first pandemic of modern times”, adding: “We all learnt as we went along.
“As ministers gained in confidence, we did get to the point of being able to understand and analyse the data much better. In fact, I would construct spreadsheets based on international data and sometimes present my findings at Cabinet and Covid-O meetings."
Grant Shapps is attempting to not only distance himself from Lockdowns but paint himself as a hero, standing up for the little people. He is now trying to claim that he knew all along that lockdowns weren't needed yet, just as with that other lockdown lier, Rishi Sunak, there is no evidence he did anything against them. His voting record shows that he voted for all the same lockdowns, restriction and diktats as Sunak did. If he was against Lockdowns, and the power SAGE was holding over government then he should have resigned and spoken out against it. He did nothing.
This sort of thing is unlikely to save him when prosecutions start, no matter how many spreadsheets he claims to have made.
Arrests should be made says Bev Turner