Bereaved families of Covid and campaigners told a Cabinet minister they fear lessons won’t be properly learnt from the pandemic.
They criticised that there is no formal way to ensure recommendations made by the Covid Inquiry are listened to or responded to by those in power.
Pat McFadden promised the group the “fresh eyes” of a new Labour government and ensured families their efforts would not go to waste. He told the event in Parliament: “When you’re a new government, one of the advantages that you have is being able to look at things with fresh eyes. We do want more resilience. We do want to fix the foundations and we do want to be able to be speedier and more flexible whenever the next crisis, whatever its nature, comes at us.”
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Addressing families, Mr McFadden added: “You’ve done an incredible amount of good work so far and when I saw the invitation I really wanted to be here today to tell you that, to tell you to keep going, to help us learn because government can’t do it all by itself and to assure you that the efforts that you’re making are helping us in our work to try to make sure that the country is better equipped.”
Charity Inquest’s director Deborah Coles said there were over 550 prevention of future deaths reports that came from inquests last year, while there are 17 public inquiries ongoing in the UK currently. But Ms Coles said Inquest has identified “a really shameful lack of accountability”, with nobody checking that stakeholders have responded to recommendations made. She said: “What possible purpose do these serve if there’s no way of monitoring the actions of those to whom these recommendations are made?”
Inquest, which provides support on state related deaths, is calling for a new public body that would make sure organisations and the Government are held to account over recommendations made after a crisis. It would make sure companies must take action if ordered to after major events such as the Covid pandemic, the Grenfell tragedy or the Hillsborough disaster.
Matthew Fowler, founder of the Covid-19 Bereaved Families For Justice group and who lost his father Ian to Covid in April 2020, said that getting to this stage and getting a Covid-19 inquiry was an “uphill battle” in itself. “When I say a battle, I mean this was blood, sweat and tears all day, everyday for years,” he said. “When the module one report was released, I cried and it was the first time that I’d cried since my dad had died because for that moment, in that instant, all of the work, all of that blood, sweat and tears that I’d done was justified.
“There’s nothing I can do to bring my dad back. He’s gone. But if, through the work that I’ve done, through the work that the rest of the bereaved have done, we make sure that other people don’t go through that in the future, then every effort is well spent.”
The event in Parliament coincides with the launching of his group’s report Act Now, Save Lives. Among its recommendations the report has demanded the Government better understand inequalities experienced during the pandemic, including around structural and institutional inequalities. The group also wants a Secretary of State for Resilience and Civil Emergencies to be instated as well as for a special pandemics committee to advise on risks, resilience and preparedness to be established.