Video URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMfc98lOw_M
One of the reasons I wanted to come in and talk to you was because I want to just talk freely. How does that all feel for you personally? That thought that one week earlier we could have saved 21,000 lives. There were some mistakes that we made in terms of the measures. Yeah. How they were brought in. Well, now you see Stephen, you're getting into gotcha questions. No, I genuinely just all total rubber. I'm not I've not even asked the question yet. There needs to be boundaries. You have to get No, no. Those rules Yeah. were not in place. Can I ask the question? You can ask a question. I'm going to ask a question. This bit is really hard for me. People say you you were a contradiction. Yeah. What's your response to that? Could you do me a quick favor? If you're listening to this, please hit the follow or subscribe button. It helps more than you know. And we invite subscribers in every month to watch the show in person. When I started the D CEO, I wanted to create a platform where we get to see behind the scenes, where we get the truth, where we get the context. That is at least my attempt. The rest of it is up to the viewer to decide what they make of the conversation and what they take from the conversation. And the same applies to this episode. So without further ado, I'm Steven Bartlett and this is the D of CEO. I hope nobody's listening, but if you are, then please keep this to yourself. [Music] Matt, I was really really keen to have you come and join me in my in my kitchen here in in London to talk in a long form way about a ton of different things that are front of mind for you that have gone on over the last couple of years. I think you know usually and you've listened to this podcast before so you know I typically start about with childhood and all those things which I will get on to but the question that was really front of mind for me and I think will be for a lot of people is why did you want to have this
conversation here? Hm. Well, I love your podcast. One of the reasons I love it is cuz I think what you managed to do is you managed to get people to be really um really honest about themselves. Right. One of the things I admire about the podcast is that um it's important that we have a space where people can talk about where things go well and where people have failed and what they've learned from that. and you're so um sort of brutally honest with yourself about it and you really put that on the line and that in turn gets it out of other people and you know I've been through this um extraordinary experience of being the health secretary in the pandemic. There's a lot of you know things that I've learned through that and learned about myself. Um and I I want to be able to articulate how I saw it if you like. I just think that you're it's just one of the most self-aware podcasts that I've I' I've listened to and I now I'm completely hooked. Oh, so let's start then. I was brought up in a happy, loving, complicated modern family. Yeah. Explain. And why why complicated? Well, complicated because my parents separated when I was two and I effectively grew up with four parents. So the both of them happily remarried before I can really remember. So it was complicated in the way that lots of modern families are complicated and I have I have a half brother. I have step brothers and sisters but it was also it was also very it was very loving and every you know I got that that love and support from from four parents rather than the normal two. What were you like in school? Well, one of the biggest things that happened to me was that I I after primary school, primary school is in this lovely um very rural cheshure uh primary school, a very very uh straightforward, small uh warm. And then at the age of 10, they put me in for the or I was asked if I wanted to put go in for the exam for the local independent school a year early. This was the probably one of the biggest things that happened in my childhood because you know I went and did the exam and I got
through and I went to school. So I went to secondary school a year early. Suddenly I went from being finding it all pretty straightforward to really having to struggle to keep up, really having to work hard and both socially and academically suddenly I was in this, you know, I was in with a group of big group of people who were all a year ahead of me. And combine that with my sort of my mother's work work ethic. You know, she started her own business and worked incredibly hard and um you know that had a it had a it had a big impact on me. In what way? Specifically on the social side. You said you were socially struggling to keep up. Were you bullied? Um a bit. I wouldn't say that was the ma that was the main thing but I was but yeah people it was tough. People were tough on me. Um, and um, and I'm also quite sort of, you know, self-confident and exuberant and that sometimes has robbed people up the wrong way, especially when you're the little guy at school. So, I think, you know, that so that I'm I'm sure that part of the sort of the drive that I have comes from the fact that I found myself age 10 suddenly in a very, you know, a tough environment. And you you ultimately must have done pretty well in that secondary school where you were trying to fit in because you went to Oxford which is just Yeah. So I went to Oxford a year early you know so I was you went to got into secondary school year early. Exactly. And you studied politics, philosophy and e economics, right? Which is a lot of a lot of people that go on to become politicians study study that course. That seems to be almost like a bit of a right of passage to politics in a way because you've got you know people like is it Ed Milliban, David Cameron, Jeremy Hunt that have all studied that. The list goes on. Michael Ed, right? Um, Ed. Yeah. So, one of the things that as being a bit of a a like a I guess there's two questions here. The first is why did you choose politics?
I I thought it would just I thought it was the most interesting thing to do. I actually got into it through the economics. So, I did I I studied economics A level cuz I was really interested in business. Right. And what what happened was this that um when I was a teenager in the early '9s, my mom's business nearly went bust and we had a moment when we had this uh our major client themselves was struggling in the recession in the early '90s and couldn't pay their bills. So, it was a classic late payment cash crunch for a small business. We knew that if we didn't get this check by the end of the week, then the company was was going under. Eventually on the Wednesday or the Thursday, the check arrived and the business was saved and it went on to to prosper. But that made me ask this question, you know, how come a perfectly good business employing a load of people who are working incredibly hard, how can that go bust or be at risk of going bust for something completely outside of their control? And the sort of sense of injustice in that made me then ask how does the economy work? And that's what led me to to take an interest in economics which I had a real affinity with. I loved it as an A levels subject and that so that's what led me to to um to PPE at at that age say like 18 1920. Yeah. Were you were you aspiring to become a politician? No I was inspir aspiring to become an entrepreneur. So I actually I almost did economics and management at Oxford and then somebody told me it was easier to get into PPE than economics and management. So and that sounded close enough to what I wanted to do. So that's why I ended up doing it. Is there not because because when I because people have said to me, you know, I've had business success and all these things. I've built a platform. People say have suggested, "Oh, maybe you should go into politics, Steve." And the thing that scares the life out of me is it's like a lose-lose game. People are going to [ __ ] hate you regardless of what you do. So I I I sometimes wonder like who are these people that like want to be politicians? So Well, thanks. Um the um but it's
true, right? And my my experience as health secretary is is you get you know some people uh are some people love you and some people hate you, right? I was I was on the tube and I never know what that what what how it's going to be when they come up and see me. So I was on the tube last night um and some enormous guy in a heavy metal t-shirt, long hair comes up to me and I'm like how's this going to go? And he said I just want to say thanks. I got my vaccines because of you and I'll never forget it. I was like, "Oh, well, that won't that could have got worse." And and so and so you you know and and obviously not every interaction is um is as cheerful to put it diplomatically. And so in a way, you know, that is part of it. You know that if you're going to make a big decision that affects lots of people's lives, some people are going to like it and some people aren't. Um that isn't what got me into politics. What got me into politics was the observation that that's where the big decisions are made. And quite rightly in a democracy, you know, the big calls in economics to stop other people going through the same experience that I did as an early teenager with my parents' business where it almost went bust for something completely outside their control. And that and that and that's what drove me. And the combination of the interest and you know because it's very interesting politics and the mission uh got me there. Um so one of the things that has also always leveled at the like political system in our country is that and you kind of see this from you know you studied politics philosophy and economics at Oxford is that a lot of the people that do go on to make those big decisions as you've described. Yeah. They come from like privilege. Right. Right. And even you know you you know your parents went through a tough time but living in Cheshire is I'd rather live there than Moside. Right. It's it's a it's a privileged place to to grow up and to live and going into an independent school. you went to Kings King School Chester King School in Chester as well, which is a privileged place to come from. So, one of the
things that I've always contended with and is, you know, and honestly, one of the things that actually quite quite honestly put me off ever going into politics was this prospect that it's kind of this elitist club where they all come from Oxford and and then the problem you have with that, if that is true, right, is that the decisions then that are made for all of us are made from people that have walked different set of foot pathways, right? Okay. So, I think there's a few bits. Let's park the Oxford point because actually if we get if Oxford and Cambridge and the other top universities get it right then actually they are great um meritocratic levelers because the thing that Oxford really did for me not only taught me how to read and write but it also it took a provincial boy from Cheshure and put him into exactly the group that you describe. Right. So I was from a very much a middle class background. But if those the the top universities get their their selection right, who they choose and if they get the the support right so that people from your sort of background feel encouraged and drawn towards them and then supported once you get there then they can be great levelers. Okay. So so but let's park the sort of Oxbridge debate because that's a sort of uh you know that debate will go on for as long as those universities are preeminent I imagine. I think the most important thing in politics is where where you're going and what you're trying to achieve and one of the most important skills that I think is incredibly hard to communicate in politics but is vital to doing the job well is empathy. Right? And you can't walk other people's um uh shoes except through empathy and and you the lived experience of a particular background is incredibly important and I'm I'm a you know I'm a big fan of welcoming people trying to get people into politics from all sorts of backgrounds. So I'm not disagreeing with your critique. The point is each and every one of us has our own background. The way that you can try to get over the problem that you describe is through empathy and that's and that's incredibly important.
I can't have empathy for what it's like to be a woman, for example, because I've never been one. No, that's not true. You can have empathy for it, but not but sorry. I can have empathy, but I I I I believe that empathy comes real real true empathy for someone else comes from understanding the pain or struggle or situation they're going through. And I can never truly understand the pain or struggle that say for example a woman facing discrimination when she's trying to raise money is going through because I have never experienced that. So I can guess what it might feel like. It's like almost like the topic of racism, I think. Like no one can know. I don't know how a white male politician that's gone to Oxford will know what it's like to be called the n-word on the playground when I was 11 and how that made me feel like the feelings of shame and being different that I then went on to feel. Yeah. So, so I I I tend to believe that the the way we create a truly empathetic political system is by finding a way to get people in. I've come from like low economic housing and different backgrounds and minorities. So when I look at the political landscape and I see that a lot of, you know, a lot of people have come through a very like too many people have come through a very privileged background, it makes me think that the decisions that are going to go on to be made will lack that true understanding of what it's like to grow up in a house that is like damp and moldy and there's rats and stuff. So there's there's I'm grinning because there's two ways to answer this, right? But the thing that's absolutely screaming at me to say to you is that is why you should go into politics. But I feel like I can't get in because because of course you can get in. You'd be you'd be I I'll sign you up now. It depends on which party you want to join. That's uh I can only speak for one of them. But but go for it. So firstly, that's my actual response. But the other thing is it's it is wrong to say that you cannot um uh that you can't empathize with with others and others situations. You can't have lived somebody else's life, but you can seek to try to um to
understand where they're coming from. And and I certainly do that. And you know, that's part of representing a constituency. I think it's actually really hard to communicate in politics. uh this this the empathy point because it's really easy to generalize um and and it comes down to the fact that if you poll people, right, most people think that politicians are useless, but when you name a politician, they tend to think that they're their local person, their local MP, they tend to think that they're great, right? So there's a gap between what people think of politicians as a whole and think of individuals who they've interacted with. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I think I think I think I can def defin definitely emp empathize with pain and suffering and all of those things. I just think in order to create a truly like representative political system, sure, it needs to be full of people who have actually gone through those things as opposed to, you know, I think the thing that's always put me off is because when I heard about this like, you know, everyone's come, you know, a lot of politicians have come from a certain background and then you see how promotions and stuff are done. It makes me think that it's a bit of like a, you know, a system where we're we're promoting our friends and bringing them up and if they've gone to Oxbridge and I went, you know, I studied with them, I'll I'll promote them when I get there. So I want it's always felt to me like running would be very very very difficult um because I didn't go I don't come from that sort of privileged Oxbridge like typically quite boys club place. That's how it feels right for me. So I might be wrong. I think I I I really think you're wrong because I think actually the system in a way um uh because of this problem um the system is actually tries to draw people through faster. Um is it doing a good enough job? Uh I mean look at actually um give him his credit, you know, look at who Boris Johnson has put in his cabinet, right? And um I know that you're immediately thinking of people he was at the same school and university as. Right. Um but there are an awful lot of people who weren't. Right. And I don't want to go
through the individual backstory of you know the guy who arrived age nine from uh Kurdistan with only a his dad with only a pound in his pocket. Yeah. Right. um Saja Javid who grew up in one of the poorest streets in Bristol and made it uh from there and by the way who's from a family of amazing amazing uh men um his I think he's got four brothers there's five of them um uh Rishi Sunnak right he grew up in a his his mum's a pharmacist he grew up in a pharmacy right there are there are loads of people who have made it from difficult backgrounds and and actually I'm sad that you have the impression that that you do cuz it's not really my experience of uh of of being there. So you you you make the decision then to move towards politics. You become eventually George Osborne's chief of staff in 200 2005ish. Yeah. And in 2010 you became the MP for Midsuffk. West SuffK. West Suffuk. Okay. Right. And that that was your I guess your your entry into politics. Yeah. Moving forward then you you you know you get promoted a few times and then Theresa May comes in and demotes you. Yeah. Yeah. So she demoted you to Minister of State of Dig digital culture. Digital and culture. And God that was a brilliant job. I mean so why did she demote you? She demoted me because they decided they wanted a uh a clean break from the Cameron Osborne years. She didn't like George Osbor George. Well, she fired him pretty brutally and I was just, you know, head below the parapet enough to get through and she demoted me. I was I was attending the cabinet at the time and um she I I remember the meeting it was um they had told the press that they were going to fire people until 11:00 a.m. and then start hiring people. And I was asked to go and see her at 10:50. So I thought, "Oh, this isn't going to go very well." I walked in and I was she'd been running about 15 minutes late. So I walk in and there's a clock on the wall in her housecom's office and it says 11:05 and I said oh it's gone 11 so I guess this is going to be okay and because I
thought well you know at least make a laugh if she's going to be firing me you know why why make it unpleasant and uh she said well that depends how you react because um I uh there isn't a a space for you in my cabinet uh but I know you're really interested in digital and that's one of the big things that's going on in the Uh, so would you like to be the uh the number two uh in DCMS and uh and and be responsible for digital policy and just keep your head down and and sort and um and sort that out? And I I leapt at it. It was absolutely wonderful. This is maybe a bit of my political naivity, but when I when I was reading through that you'd be you'd been the minister for like digital business, enterprise, energy, and ultimately health. Yeah. How can one person know anything about any of that stuff? How can anyone be a master of like five, six different things? Yeah, because that's not the job. So, um it's not the job to be the master in a way. It's the job to be the people's representative amongst the experts. So, your job as the minister is to be able to be the representative of the people who is responsible for the direction of that policy area. and you have endless experts. Your job is not to be an expert. It's to listen to the experts and then decide democratically what direction do we want to go. So take I mean an area that I do know you know I I did have a background in take on um the future of the internet and um what was your background in that? uh well only that I I you know I can code and I understand a bit of um about technology but the big question was how do you keep children safe online right and how you make take the internet from a sort of a wild west and social media to a place where people have more protection you know is it that was the the the you know most important question in that area at the time and for that yes you need experts but you also need a you basically You need a view of where you want to get to. It's a it's a it's you want to you you need to set the mission and the direction. It's leadership that's needed. My background is social media and I actually whenever I see like the social
media policies being set, I always the the debate we have in social media and digital is like who is it that's making these decisions because the people we see when we obviously the spokespeople as you've described Yeah. we know that they don't know it like us. So we think that we we we we pray that the decisions aren't made poorly. So let's take cuz that can be the subject we use to describe all of these industries that you've you've led as minister. So as it relates to say social media when you're trying to understand what policies to set for children to keep them safe. Yeah. You're telling me there's this like group of experts behind the scenes who are discussing and feeding information and then your role to play is in deciding Yeah. on the trade-offs. The trade-offs, right? Which would which needs expertise to know what the trade-offs are. Yeah. Yeah. Um and then also and communicating them communicating it to the public. Yeah. Understanding what the public is expecting because sometimes experts can get so close to their subject matter that you got to be like yeah but there's you know there's 60 million people over there who aren't experts and they need the voice in the room as well. You're ultimately the person when you're in charge of digital that is making these calls. So you speak to the experts then make the calls. My my thing is on a topic like digital the harm that can be done if someone doesn't understand that area of expertise because ultimately the minister makes the call you can like destroy an industry [ __ ] an like [ __ ] an economy so I've always thought that the person making the call should be should be really experienced in that subject matter and that doesn't seem to be the case because of the design of the political system because of democracy ste it's democracy and that's good and right because when you have technocratic government you can you just get you know experts are so focused on their area
that sometimes they just don't see the big picture. So you're saying you need that impartial kind of outsider to Yeah, that's what that's what I tried to be as a as a as a minister. Um, and also so it's about lifting people's eyes to the to the the you know the big social trade-offs. And I mean that in the best sense that you know the trade-offs within society um how free to be versus uh how safe to be in the in the internet. It's an absolute classic of political philosophy right and um people have been worrying about that question in the offline world for 300 years. and we were bringing that sort of approach um into the online world as opposed to just leaving it as a completely libertarian space. Um but the the job is to is to synthesize the expert view but not just not just follow it because the experts can become so focused but also they can't sometimes provide the leadership right to say we we're going over there and and you know like yes of course we're going to take on um Facebook over some of the harmful content. Yeah, of course we are. We're not just going to lie down and say that they can make the rules up. It's interesting because when I see the political debates with things like Facebook, a lot of the government officials both here and in the US haven't got a [ __ ] clue what Facebook is. And you can see them asking Mark Zuckerberg the most dumb, naive questions about the platform. And then as an outsider watching, yeah, that these people that don't understand what they're talking about are ultimately going to be writing the legislation as someone that works in the industry and could actually tell you what in my view having worked in the industry for 10 years deep in it. Yeah. that fully understands things like the Cambridge Analytica scandal and data data privacy and really also understands the context of the media pressure which is sometimes uh comes doesn't come is agenda based um and and I I worry so getting right so getting a rational solution out of that bundle of problems yeah is not easy yeah so what would you it kind of is
but it is dem but it but it is democratic to ensure that somebody who is who represents um represents people is ultimately making the decision but if they're any good they'll listen to the advice that you get. I think I think my view is that they should represent the people for sure and I think that spokesman role in leadership is incred incredibly important but I also feel like they should h like have deep understanding of the nuance and complexity and have experience in the thing which kind of brings me on to you became in charge of health as well the health minister which is obviously something not in your wheelhouse. No. So I'm I'm a um doctors ask me you know why should a non-d doctor yeah be responsible for the health service. Now two answers to that first is well it's pretty arrogant of doctors to say it should be a doctor what about a nurse right because there's more nurses in the NHS than doctors park that minor local issue right the reason is cuz I am there as the representative not just of those who work in the health service but of the people who use the health service which is to say all of us. And so I think actually it's better for the health secretary to essentially be somebody who is a who is there on the side of the patients. You of course you listen to the the clinical advice you know and some of the most amazing brains in the world right like like Chris Witty Jonathan Vanam these people are amazing wonderful communicators very shrewd advisers ultimately it's right that the person taking the decisions is representing the people through the democratic process we have um and not representing the uh the producers if you like that is a that is a better way of structuring it. You think you you believe that? I really do. I mean I look I I don't know these issues deeply enough to to know the full complexities and this is maybe even proving my point that I don't understand the nuance of politics. So I can't actually say if that's a better or worse system. One would assert though that the best solution might be to have someone who understands the side of the patient
because they are one. We're all humans. We all live in this society. So we use the NHS. That gives me a little bit of empathy as to the the you know the the the system from a patient's perspective but also someone that understands health and and the nuances of that. Maybe that's spent the last 10 or 20 years as you know working within the industry and can understand those layers you know more than someone who was working in digital 5 minutes ago can. It's just an observation as like a naive outsider like why do people that don't have experience in a subject matter become the minister for it? Yeah, it's quite a common um it's it's quite a common critique of politics. Um and different countries deal with it different ways, right? So some countries the entire cabinet is made up of people who aren't in parliament. Um like you know the US cabinet is made up of people who who have to by law not be in the Senate or the House of Representatives. But then you get even more of a divide between the sort of political and and the democratic over here and the essentially technocratic over there. Actually, I think that our system is better than the US system because it's because these two things are emerged together. Um because you do you get in taking these decisions, you get incredible um advice. You get access to, you know, the all the industry experts that you want to talk to and and ultimately you're making, you know, you're making balanced judgments. The way the UK does it as well is the civil service will never put forward a proposal that they don't think is workable. That's the that's the deal, right? So you do have these long-term uh experts who have been in in the field um and they will uh they'll say okay this is where the way I I tried to do it was I'd say this is where I think we need to get to how should we best get there and then the experts will come up with a plan of how to get there uh and you know you might have a view on some of the details of that but essentially I saw my job as saying this is the mission and then communicating how we get there and then being advised on the way from A to B because the the thing you lose if you go for your model is you lose the democratic input and um and and that can lead to things going wrong.
In 2019 you when Theresa May stepped down, you ran to be the next prime minister or at least to lead the party, right? Well, and that would lead you to being the prime minister. Yeah. Um why did you want to be the prime minister? Because I thought that there was a need for a complete fresh start. Did you think you'd win? No. I'm extra honest. Yeah. No, but I I had fun trying. Um, no, I didn't I didn't think I'd win. Um, but I wanted to get some I wanted to get some arguments made, right? I worried that my I worried that we were the party was talking not enough about how it's enterprise that leads to prosperity. Is it a publicity thing running? Because they I watch the US elections every year. I'm obsessed with it. And it and the same people run every year. they know they're not going to win, but I think the the exposure and publicity you get is incredible. Yeah, there's a of course um that's one of the consequences. I basically had an argument I wanted to make which was which was okay, Brexit decisions been taken. Uh let's get that done and get on to building a stronger economy in the future and basically get it done as quickly as we can and move forward. That was the argument I wanted to make. I managed to make the argument quite sort of loudly because I was running Um and then um uh well and then I pulled out pulled out came seventh got behind Boris. I 10 was it? Did you come seventh out of 10 or was it I sixth or seventh? Oh yeah. And then you got behind Boris. And then I got behind Boris. Um because you knew he would win. Yeah. It was obvious that he was going to win. Also, I came to the view that um he he could sort the problem that we were stuck with of Brexit better than any of the other candidates. Um and also I thought, you know, this guy has great capabilities and he needs people around him. I've had so many people tag me on Instagram, even
on Telegram and in my Twitter DMs in a picture of them starting their Hule journey. And it's one of the most amazing things in my life that I get to do a podcast, which of course needs money to to to fuel. And I have a sponsor like Hule who I genuinely believe is going to help every single person who starts their heel journey change their life because this podcast, the central intention of this podcast is to help people live better lives. And we get to sit here and I get to promote to you a product which has not only helped me change my life, but it's going to help millions of people and is helping millions of people live a nutritionally complete life. It's so it's such an incredible product. And for me, the reason why it's incredible is because it gives me my protein. It gives me my vitamins, minerals, it's plant-based, it's low in sugar, gluten-free, it does all of that in a small drink that tastes good. There are other products, there's foods, there's the hot and savory collection, many other things. But for me, this ready to drink is the absolute savior of my diet throughout the week where I'm moving at such pace. Look, I don't want to labor the point, but if you haven't tried here, give it a try. And if you do, tag me, Instagram, wherever you try it, give me a tag. Anyway, back to the podcast. We move forward to co which was, you know, you you get appointed as being the health minister when a pandemic rolls in. I know. I remember I remember seeing the um the the Chinese publication on the 1st of January. So, it's New Year's Day and I saw this uh thing on the inside pages of one of the newspapers um to say um the Chinese just announced that there's a a new uh disease um and nobody knew we didn't know it was a corona virus. It might have been a flu. Uh and nobody knew whether it was serious or not. But I remember thinking, "Well, maybe this is it." But I didn't really think it was until um until a couple of weeks later. When was that that cuz I you know, I was reading through all of the minutes from your Sage meetings to try and understand the the kind of phases of cuz I listen I run business, right? And we have crises and chaos and all those things and there's various stages you go
through of trying to understand exactly what this is and then how you know how impactful it's going to be. Yeah. and then what we should be doing and I kind of ran through all of that. So when when in your view did you start to realize that this wasn't just a cold or end of January. So the Chinese published the sequence of the genome of the of the virus. So we then knew it was a corona virus. Um that was bad news right because we had a stockpile of flu vaccine uh for this sort of emergency if it had been a flu. Um, and the fact that it was a corona virus and spreading this rapidly in China was bad news. And then at that point, I remember Chris Witty saying to me, it's 50/50. Something this contagious, either they can hold it in China or if it gets out of China, it's going to go global. So, we were by the end of January, we were on to um developing the vaccine, for instance. um and trying to get the testing system up and running. And then we had this surreal month during February when nobody else was sort of thinking that this was a big thing and we still thought it was 50/50 but 50% chance of a global pandemic is you know very very bad and we were I remember standing next to the speakers chair in the House of Commons for a PMQ's watching every single question was about something else and nobody asked a question about what became known as COVID and I remember thinking at the end of the session, the end of half hour, every single question that has been asked is totally irrelevant because it's all about other things and we've got this one fact in China and it is it's totally dominant. Why weren't you raising the bell? Oh, I was I was giving statements to parliament and what have you and we were preparing inside government for what needed to happen. So at the end of January uh uh JVT came and said um I said how long will it take to get a vaccine? He said well normally it would take 5 years but we think we can do it in a year to 18 months. He said January. Yeah. If everything goes well and I said your mission is to have a vaccine by Christmas and we we he and the team that
we built pulled it off. Um so we were getting things moving and then it was when we saw the pictures from Italy. Do you remember the you know that was the moment that I knew it was global and that was what month? That was the end of February. February. Yeah. Yeah. It was the end of February half term cuz everything was calm at this point. We were watching it happen overseas. I mean like I remember this the China scenes. Yeah. Everyone was kind of calm about it. Old China having a problem. That's kind of how it felt. And then the Italy moment was was terrifying. Yeah. That was the moment when it was obvious it was coming. Right. Um and um I remember having a call that uh my my my German opposite number who I got you became very close to. He phoned me up. He said, "Have you seen these pictures out of Italy?" I was like, "Yeah." He was like, "This is it." And he's like, "Yeah, this is it." Um so that was the end of Yeah. That was the end of February. But still in March, there was a lot of confusion in those stage minutes about what to do. Yeah. About what was going to happen. Could could we stop it? Complete lack of data. That's the that was the problem. Total positive data. Um we had a um we didn't have a testing regime. We had to build that from scratch. Uh and so you didn't know how many people had it. Um we didn't know the characteristics of the disease. Uh we didn't know what the um we didn't know what you know what the symptoms were largely because the symptoms of CO are so varied that they didn't have a full symptom list. One of the things that we didn't know for ages which we now take for granted knowing is how many people have had it and have got the antibodies. There was a big debate after the first peak of um some people saying uh they're optimists like me, but it turns out far far too optimistic, right? Saying, "Oh, you know, threequarters of people must have had it by now, so basically we're fine. Uh and we're through it." And then so I got a survey done taking people's blood and got the
got a representative sample. It took ages to get this thing up and running and we eventually got the data through that said that something like in London 15% of people had had it and outside London it was under five. It's like Christ that means almost nobody's had it and still we've had all these deaths and that means you know that was the moment we knew we had a major problem because there was no way through this other than the vaccine and Sage at this point and the meetings that you're having there there's kind of this resignation that it is going to just wipe through the population but but the issue is the the objective is now just to try and stop it smashing the NHS basically. Yeah. So the the what happened was you know we saw those predictions of the the reasonable worst case scenario but the big problem was we were going up the reasonable worst case scenario quickly you know and I remember I remember of course I remember the the day that the first person in the UK um died of COVID but but I remember the day that oddly something like the 32nd person died and it's a funny say that number but it's a there's a reason for it. I was sitting on the side of my bath at home and I got the news that we'd had 30 32 deaths and suddenly there was a this isn't you know one person for whom we've got a protocol of how you manage that um terrible as that is this is like big numbers and it was a big jump in the number and I knew that that that number was going to get bigger and the worst period the the most um sort of frightening period of the whole thing was after we'd done the lockdown we'd pulled every lever we could. So, I remember sitting in the cabinet room and saying, "We're going to have to tell people to stop all unavoidable social contact." And you probably remember, you know, that being said, and um the the really frightening time was after we'd done all those things, brought in the lockdown, we'd done everything, right? And if this disease had carried on going up, there was there was absolutely nothing more we could do. We'd shut the schools. We'd shut hospitality. You know, we'd pulled, you know, we'd set out at the start of March a a a set of options of levers
that we could pull to try to stop this thing. And by the middle of March, we'd pulled every lever. And it was a um and and so the next two weeks as the numbers carried on going up, they carried on going up for about 10 days because of the incubation period. That was that was that was really scary. And then and then and then they started to turn and then we knew we could get this thing under. The criticism leveled at the UK is that we were the last like major western country to pull those levers you've described in mid-March. And when you look through the minutes there is just like several weeks of like confusion and indecision. And obviously in those weeks as you've described there what you didn't from what I've seen in the minutes and subsequent interviews is what you didn't know was the speed of transmission that was going on. And obviously because of that 14-day death delay. Delay. Yeah. So, so it's funny that I'm, you know, it's funny that the previous conversation we had was about how you should have the experts making the decisions. Yeah. The truth is we didn't have the the experts didn't have the data either. So, these were difficult calls actually in terms of where we were on the curve. We pulled the levers ahead of other countries because we were a bit behind Italy and and um uh uh Spain. Um but the um lever so Spain and Spain, France and Italy went into lockdown on the 9th of March. Yeah. But we reckoned that we were several weeks behind them in terms of the progress of the virus that it as in it had come to those countries first and then from them to us. But either way and that was wrong. the big picture. We we were much closer to them than than than uh we were being than the best estimate, right, by these by the best people who were in Sage, the the scientists. And you know what it felt like was this is an enormous call. So the costs of action are huge. The costs of inaction are also huge. So you you know we knew when we were sitting around the cabinet table making these decisions that the that the the the balance between these two was an enormous enormous unknown. So in a with an unprecedented virus with very little
data. We were essentially you know doing these things that were so we knew we were very were going to be very damaging. If you think about the story about I I told earlier about coming in I I came into politics partly because I had this searing formulative experience of something completely outside of our control nearly knocking out the livelihood of my family. Right? And here I am participating in decisions that were going to have a more devastating impact on on businesses and and and people who rely on social contact in order to to survive and thrive. So we were hugely aware of the of the pain that would come from the decisions as well as the pain that would come from uh from delay. And the other thing that we didn't know was how the public would react, right? And this is there there's an optimistic story which is the public were amazing, you know, and and the advice that we were getting was we're not sure whether the public will will will put up with lockdown for very long. Um and so you got to time the period of lockdown. Actually, the public were amazing once you explain that, you know, there's a serious problem. Um we're all going to have to uh do something. it's going to be uncomfortable, but we'll get through it together. And the public were amazing. Obviously, with Italy, Spain, and France locking down first, there was also a bit of a case study as to how publics will react if if presented in a certain way um to the lockdowns. The because we were later in locking down people. If you look at the numbers, they say that there's about 20 if we had locked down a week earlier, 21,000 people would still be alive from that first wave. When when you hear that, Yeah. How does that how does that sound and feel? And also around that time Boris Johnson goes and does that interview and references one of the options being taking it on the chin. And then in hindsight, how does that all feel for you personally? That thought that one week earlier we could have saved 21,000 lives. Yeah. Um it's
obviously it's something that I'll I'll always think about. Um, you know, if I search for what I really believe about that and the honest truth is the honest truth is that we didn't know. And of course, you know, hindsight is a wonderful thing. And it was about it was judgments based on on on these you know this the the the balance of these two scales. Um and um I think that whenever you go through a period of history ultimately it's about learning from it. You know you've got to make sure that that if this if a pandemic you know a disease happens again we'll be far better prepared. And I think that the I think the Far East was far better prepared because they'd been through MS and SARS and and um honestly that how how I feel is like I really wish we'd known then what we knew now. What what if you in hindsight then because we're playing games of hindsight now which are as as they say it's 2020 but what are when you look back honestly at the decisions that were made and how you got the data and the way that the meetings were handled with Sage and all of these and ultimately what led to these decisions what in hindsight which is a wonderful thing that we can only deploy in in the past in hindsight what do you think were the mistakes or the areas where we could have done better in the decision-m how we got the information and all those things what were those mistakes in hindsight. Well, um you know, we made there were some mistakes that we made in terms of the measures. Yeah. How they were brought in as in not hard enough or just you know just details about the things that really really matter to people. Um I'll give you one example. Um funerals. We brought in rules saying that six people could go to a a funeral. I think it was it very very restrictive but for some people especially people who were shielding the rules were interpreted as in some cases even the spouse shouldn't go to the funeral if they were shielding. Now that was that was terrible. I remember watching that the film of a young boy who died who was buried by people in
hazmat suits without his parents there and you know that was just awful and you know you listen to that right and we changed the rules and made it made it clear so you know that was a that was all all the time I tell you know all the time we were on the lookout for, okay, what do we need to be doing differently? Cuz it was unprecedented. And there was a um and you know, in hindsight, some of it looks like these were sort of hard and fast and obvious decisions. They weren't obvious decisions at all, and we were constantly sort of questioning ourselves uh in terms of um in terms of whether we got the judgment right. What was your life like in that time? Oh, yeah. Well, I I so my alarm went off at 6:00 every morning and um I'd um you know, I I basically had about uh half an hour with the kids in the morning and then uh I'd get picked up at 7:30, maybe 7:00 and uh and then and then work just, you know, unbelievable. um until about about midnight. And I you know what my my permanent secretary Chris Wald at the start said, "This is not going to be over in a in a couple of weeks, right? You've got to get we've all got to get ourselves into a position where we can just keep going. This is a marathon, not a sprint." And um um and there was a um a weekend basically meant that we didn't start work till about 9:00. And so that was the you know that was the the time off. so to speak. And that it was like that for three or four months during that period. What about your mental health position? Cuz I Yeah. You know, cuz that feeling that going home every day with that feeling that my decisions could sway as we saw negatively in this case, you know, 21 million 21,000 lives for better or for worse and ultimately, you know, 160,000 people died. You're going home with that every day with that thought that your deci the decisions you're making now as health secretary Yeah. are life and death. How do you relax? How do you Yeah, I think that's I relaxation I got to through exercise. Um but the um in the health department the sense was a total sense of mission.
Um and I've never been in the military but some people say this is what it's like when you're on a military operation as well. um as in there was a focus over how to optimize how we could make decisions. You know, of course there were sleepless nights, but really we thought, you know, when we had some, you know, Chris Witty himself is a brilliant advisor on how to keep yourself, you know, personally in the um in in the zone. So the the sense of mission that we were trying to solve something that was incredibly difficult as best as we could um was very very strong in that period. Did you have anxiety? It depends what you mean by anxiety. Of course I was anxious about every you know all these big decisions about that that awful sense of nervousness that you know can be crippling at times you know that yeah but it was yes up to the but not about I you know I didn't I didn't find it I I didn't find it crippling. I found it motivating. Do do you know when I say anxiety, do you know what I mean? I mean, there's the the kind of phrase of describing something as being an anxious situation, but then actually suffering with anxiety. Yeah. Not not in a medical I didn't feel that in a medical sense. I basically felt like I got up in the morning and I did my level best and then I went to sleep and then I woke up and repeated the exercise and that and for me that was the only way to get through it without sort of collapsing in a hoop. If you'd known that a pandemic would roll in, would you have avoided that health secretary job? Be honest with me. I don't know. I don't know. That's a great question. Someone's got to do it. Would you have if you knew that that situation was coming? If I knew this situation was coming, there's about hundred things I'd immediately have done, right? We would have No, no, no. I mean, would you have put yourself in that role if you knew the if if I said now there's a pandemic coming next week. Do you want do you want the job of being health secretary? Such a what if question?
But I I would answer it. The honest truth is yes. You would take it. Yeah. Okay. Cuz someone's got to make the decisions. Okay. So, one of the one of the Do you know what do you know what the the overriding sense is um that I'm trying to articulate not particularly well is a sense of this sense of duty, right? when the really bad stuff happens and and you're in the job, you got to stand up and be counted. One of the decisions that was made was and ultimately criticizes this whole care home stuff. What's your view on that before we Yeah. So, so okay, this is a really good example of um the the the of of of learning from what you're seeing on the ground. So the criticism runs that um the NHS made a decision to get people out of hospitals because we needed hospital space and send them into care homes and that took COVID with them and a lot of people died. Um that criticism is wrong. Um but there's a different criticism which is more accurate. The re the reason that's wrong is um twofold. There's been a piece of work that's a piece of uh analysis that's done that shown that approximately 2% of the uh infections that got into care homes were from that route. Um the um and the reason for that is that when those people went into the care homes they were they then isolated in the care homes um because they weren't tested because the tests didn't exist. Now I wish to God that the tests had existed and we you know that was a big part of my life trying to build this testing system um but they they didn't exist and most of those people who left hospital actually went home not into not into care homes. The truth is that the peak in the care homes came about a month later. So the facts don't even stack up this narrative but there've been there you know there's a few false narratives that have got going about the pandemic and that's one of them. The truth is, and we couldn't say it, we didn't want to say it at the time because we didn't want to demotivate people, but the truth is that the main route of the virus getting into care homes sadly was from staff because staff live in the community and this disease
was rife in the community, but I didn't want to stand at that podium and give the impression I was blaming the staff. The thing that we then did was we changed the rules so you could not work in more than one care home. And in the second wave the number of deaths in care homes was far far lower and we had the testing. So actually the what we needed to have done was do the do the pol the staff movement policy much earlier and we hadn't we hadn't spotted that that was the route. Um and so you know there there's an inquiry that will come and go through all these things and I'm actually looking forward to it because there's a whole series of points where we've got to make sure we learn the right lesson. Uh, and then there's a couple of other things that are upper there that, you know, just aren't true and need to be like this whole, you know, we talked about criticism as a politician, right? One of the things I've been criticized for is for giving a contract to the local pub landlord, right? I don't know whether you've read that story. Yeah, I've heard all of that stuff. Yeah. It's just not true. We'll talk about that. I want to just because the point on the care home bit, it's good. So, you've answered one of my points there, which was about that whole rumor that people were being released from the NHS into care homes and that was causing issues. The thing that that I saw from the Sage minutes was that on the roughly the 10th of March, which was fairly early in all of this, Sage did say that there should be special policy consideration given to care homes and various types of types of retirement communities. Presumably, you had the data at that point that said elderly people were being disproportionately affected by so around the 10th of March, but it's there should probably should have been an action taken. And then in the sage minutes, you don't really see care homes or retirement communities mentioned again until a month later when there's been serious death in care homes. I think people going into care homes were 10 times more likely to die than if they had just gone gone home because of the because of the more than 10 times more likely to die. I think at
the peak of the the pandemic, the first wave, they were 17 times more likely to die in a care home than had they just gone home to live with, you know, in a private home. Yeah. But that's because there's lots of reasons for that. You've got to unpack it. So firstly, it is the most vulnerable people who live in care homes. So their their vulnerability to the disease is much greater. Secondly, you know, the nature of care homes is obviously that the disease can spread more easily and every European country uh had this problem. But the broader point about the sage minutes um uh around that time um action was taken but we didn't get to the policy that I think had the best impact which was the stopping people from working in more than one care home for several months afterwards. And if we if we'd known that that was going to be the thing that would say stop it as much as it did obviously we would have done that um we would have done that earlier. But but again it comes down to to not knowing. Yeah. And I I guess this is a point of judgment. Hindsight has revealed that that was a mistake. Some countries got it right. New York didn't get it right either, but other countries did get that, you know. And the other thing we were worried about, so we were worried about a different problem that didn't happen. And sometimes this, you know, it's you it's important at the to think about at the time the things we're worrying about. So in Spain, a whole care home full of elderly people had died because the staff had all gone home. So we were also worried about making sure that the care homes remained staffed because people in care homes die if the staff aren't there. So thankfully that never happened, but we were worried about the the the care the you know we were worried about the opposite problem at the same time. and um uh and and you know thankfully we avoided one but but the other one came to pass. Do you look back on that that decision in particular cuz that's one of the big criticisms that a lot of people level at the um handling of the the process. Do you look back at that as a another mistake in hindsight?
Because you you as you say, you were trying to make the best decision on balance, right? I I know I know for sure and what you've done differently is make it better. Yeah. What? So on this foresight hindsight thing, I know for sure that I did my best and I know that the team around me worked with, you know, did work with the right motives to get through as best we could. the um the importance of learning how best to handle this situation for god forbid if it happens again is absolutely vital but I worry as much about learning the wrong lessons as learning the right lessons. So that's why it's important that we have this sort of discussion about about the care homes in particular um to to make sure that just because something is in the narrative it doesn't necessarily mean it's true. Uh without doubt, if I'd known then what I know now, we would have brought in the staff movement rule much earlier. In fact, do you know what? You should probably have it in normal times as well because lots of people die each year in of flu in care homes and you know, so the and the and the processes of how flu gets into a care home are probably the same as COVID because it's just another communicable disease. when people like mark the success of um our handling of the pandemic, one of the ways that they choose to do it is to compare it to other countries and in that first wave in particular, our deaths were just so much higher than the comparable countries. So, does is that not an indicator that we messed up or that we got it or that our judgment calls turned out to be the wrong ones? A combination of a combination of things, right? combination things like the timing of the decisions to lock down. Um the obesity of our nation compared to others is one another factor. Um one of the factors that um the experts think is a cause is that lots of people travel from all over the UK to Spain and Italy during that halfter term. And so it was brought back and seeded across the whole country. Whereas other some other countries like France had it very badly in a in a couple of
cities but didn't have the spread in the way we did. So there's some things that are essentially you know just just facts of life that were outside anybody's control. Obviously that's not you know what you're getting at and it's not the stuff that really affects how I think about it because it's the it's the active decisions that we also need to you know we need to go through and learn from. So would you that's what I'm saying is is is the the the large number of deaths that we had versus other countries a indicator that we made poor decisions in that first wave. Well now you see Stephen you're getting into gotcha questions. No I genuinely cuz because we're going to come on to the good stuff right we're going to come into the fact that we're out of lockdowns for everybody else. So the but the way the reason I I reacted that way is that is that it is self-evident and obvious that you've got to improve decisions and learn from them. And the best and the best proof point of this and the best um sort of it's obvious from anybody who's run any organization is you constantly got to be asking was that the best decision? And part of leadership is to allow your team to essentially learn from and change their decisions, not stay stuck with them just because that's the decision that we took. and in the second and subsequent waves we have done relatively better internationally. So how I feel about all that is I feel um I feel sad that the performance in the first half if you like was not as good as it could have been. Okay, that answers the question. And then I feel and I but I feel pleased that we learned quite a few things and in a way you know we did better second time round. Yeah. But the thing I felt at the time, and this is true in any organization I've been in, is that if you want people to perform at their best, they have to know that if they screw up, they're not going to get shouted at. The question is not who did that, it's how do we fix it? Yeah. And that was a that attitude was a big part of um of of how things, you know, we managed to get better. You know,
testing is another example, right? testing first it was you know it was far we we didn't have any we built it as fast as we could that needed to go much faster by this Christmas the Americans were saying why can't we have a testing system like uh like the UK you know and my view is that uh do Harding did an amazing job but every time we had a screw-up the question that we asked was how do we fix it not whose fault is it did you actually think that was a gotcha question because do you think do you think I'm the type of person that would sit and I don't think you are which is why I called you out on it because No yeah yeah I It's every question I ask is honestly honestly genuine because and and then you're right there's so many things that we did better than all of these other nations and I'll be honest I'm sat here really lucky that we're able to do this in person because of the decisions that the UK took. So no what I meant by gotcha is that you know the the question of um will you get the guy to say he that there was x screw-up is a classic of the today program. I I bas my and actually frankly makes some of the decision-m harder. No, I I no I I understand what you're saying. Um my question was that is the was the the the increase in death at the start does is that evidence as people claim that we made in hindsight cuz that's all we have now in hindsight the decisions were wrong. And also there's this other exacerbating factor which was I mean the World Health Organization at the time and even I tweeted it said that there wasn't we couldn't wait for a vaccine. They said that we that's what they said. They said we couldn't wait for a vaccine because sometimes vaccines I mean there's not a vaccine for SARS still. Sometimes they take five or 10. So you so you you thought there was always going to be a vaccine. Yeah. And and and it's true that sometimes Yeah. In number 10 he was basically the only other person who agreed with me. Why did he say the take it on the chin thing? Um cuz I use that in my he was I I remember that he was he was actually trying to argue against that.
He was saying he was saying it comes down to how difficult it is to communicate in uncertainty. He was saying some people are saying we ought to take it on the chin. I don't agree with that. I think we need to act. But so one of the reasons it's hard to communicate in politics and one of the reasons it's hard to communicate empathetically is that you have to both have the actual conversation but also every single word you say can be twisted will be taken and analyzed for better or for worse. And I don't hold this against the media particularly, but they they will look at them those words both within the context and out of context. And so, you know, this is true of this interview, but I knew that coming into it and have decided just to try to answer the questions. Um the um but that is part of communication. So I the the the you know Boris saying that um some people say we should just what I can't remember the exact word. take it on the chin, right? But I don't think that's the way we should do it. Instead, we should do it that way. It was written written up as Boris Float's idea of taking it on chin. Well, he did float the idea, but he then immediately rejected it for a different proposition. I I did read the Sage minutes and to to his and your credit, you don't mention her immunity as a as the strategy to take forward in those minutes. Correct. From what I saw. So although that was a widespread narrative, it's not actually what was going on in the meeting. The truth there is that some people were pushing the herd immunity idea, right? And then um the ca it came it came it bubbled up and came to a head. Yeah. And I had I went out and killed it. I was like no we are not doing that. So you you knew that a vaccine was going to be I had at first it was faith right. At first it was faith and it gradually became more and more real. Okay. Um, and I just I I I knew that we'd got a vaccine for Ebola, right? And the the Oxford vaccine actually comes from the work several years before to get an Ebola vaccine.
Mh. And I had I just had this belief and maybe it's because I'm an optimist once the data came out in about May that showed that only you know this tiny proportion of the public had had antibodies and had had exposure and therefore it was obvious and categorically impossible to get to uh the levels of antibodies you need across society without a huge amount of suffering and death. Um i.e. the people who'd been promoting her immunity were now evidently and scientifically wrong. It wasn't just it was a bad idea, it was provably a bad idea. Once we got to that point, there was only one way out and that was a vaccine. And you know, I believe in the power of human ingenuity and I uh believed in the team in Oxford. Um, and I also thought that when the whole world is searching for something, then then somebody was going to get it right. And so we brought in u people to to go and buy from around the world like like Kate Bingham. And we took this attitude which was sure we back the British one, but we absolutely we're going shopping as well, right? And and and money is no object. Um and um and and and that's what we did and thank god we did it. Was there a tipping point where because in the sage minutes there's there's this understanding that this is going to go through the population and that really the the central objective has to be to protect the NHS and then was there a tipping point where you realized the vaccine was going to come and it was going to come quickly. So the strategy then has to go to like a the vaccine's on its way so now it's about actually limiting death as well. So it was once we found out then um that only a small proportion of the population had had it. Mhm. It was obvious from then on that the only way out was through a vaccine. And therefore the policy became to suppress the virus until a vaccine makes us safe. And I then repeated that all the way through the summer, the autumn and in the autumn I was arguing for, you know, to keep this thing under control because the vaccine's around the corner. And people were briefing against me that no, you know, Hanok's the only one who believes in the vaccine and it's a running joke that there's only one
person who thinks the vaccine is going to happen and and and partly to try to stop some of the complications that had happened in testing. I report I just spoke directly to the prime minister on this one and didn't go through his then advisers in number 10 and and and it and it came good. We have a brand new sponsor for the podcast and it's a brand called Crafted as you can see on the table in front of me if you're watching this on YouTube. crafted our brands that sell really meaningful affordable men's jewelry and I've been a crafted customer I think for about 3 years now and all of the pieces that crafted have created have deeper meaning the piece of jewelry I wear the most I want to introduce you to the pieces and why I wear them is this sand timer unsurprising and the thing for me about sand timer is it's probably the most clear reminder that our time here on earth is finite and when you live in such a way where you can literally see your time pouring away and you realize ize that it is scarce and that we're not all here forever. You start to make better decisions. You stop worrying about pettiness and trivialities that consume our lives. I always have this Crafted Sand timer around my neck as a reminder of that. And this is why I wanted Crafted to sponsor this podcast because I can use their meaningful jewelry every episode to deliver a meaningful message. Quick one. As many of you know, I've been trying to make my life a little bit more sustainable as it relates to energy ever since I sold my Range Rover Sport and bought an electric bicycle. And My Energy, as a sponsor of this podcast, are one of the brands that make that transition much, much easier. They are at the forefront of British renewable eosmart technology. And their products are really, really changing the game. If you're on YouTube, you can see what I'm holding in my hand. This is called the Eddi, right? It's the UK's number one solar powered diverter. So, what is a solar diverter? It's a device for people like you and me. That means you can divert your excess energy back into your home rather than back into the grid, which will save you power and money. It's super userfriendly and easy to install, and you can control it using the My Energy app on your phone. To find out more about this product and more
products like it that will help you make that sustainable transition, head over to myenergy.com. And um I highly recommend you check out the Eddie. It's um it's a real game changer for a product and one that I'm going to be installing in my home soon. You talked about the some of the pro procurement room is there. One of them particularly that you you meant you wanted to mention about a pub a friend that runs is a pubition or something. Yeah. So so I mean this is an example of why of how you need to go through these things properly and how narratives can sort of spin out of control. And this is true on social media which you're a great expert in but it's also true in the mainstream media. So for some reason that I that is lost in the midst of time, some of the papers got the idea that the landlord in the village that I had previously lived in in Suffukk um who had then gone on to uh run this factory had got a contract that I had given him and you know it was on the front page of the Guardian for several days and it was a and and it's just all it's not true. He didn't have a contract with the department. He didn't have a contract with the NHS. Um he yes, he he he flipped his factory to making those little plastic tubes, uh you know, the ones that you um stick your your test thing into, but we needed millions of these things and somebody had to. I didn't have anything to do with the contracting arrangements cuz he he was a subcontractor to another business. So there's no way that we I mean it's just a total it's a total nonsense. And so in a in a stressed period like a pandemic, a lot of conspiracy theories got going. This was one of them. There've been loads on on vaccines from the antivaxers and dealing. So you got to deal with that misinformation at the same time as trying to make the best decisions as you can. And that is one of the that is one of the hardest things to wrestle with in in terms of how we communicate. The um the rumor around that time was that he'd sent you a WhatsApp message and you'd like forwarded him on to someone and that had led to him getting a a deal. Yeah. So he he I mean these WhatsApps have been been published under FOI. The the WhatsApp was about something incredibly banal. It was about
standardizing the size of these tubes across different suppliers so that they could be made more efficiently. I mean like a really in the weeds bit of policy that and I just pinged this on to the people. I mean I was I it was okay. It it was at a level of detail about eight below where I was um operating. There was in 20 May 2021 there was there's some minor inadvertent breach because you held shares in a firm that had got a contract. No. No. So that's not true either. There you go. I mean this is um I I was I was given some shares in my sister's company, right? Um and they had a contract an existing contract with the Welsh NHS and I wasn't responsible for the Welsh NHS. So it's another example. How you are you familiar with that rumor that? Yeah. Yeah, of course. Of course. I mean, I have to I have to deal with the these rumors all the time and sometimes people stand up in parliament and say it and you just have to hit it on the head every time it comes up. It's just not true. But the but there's an underlying problem which is that you know the people working to save lives in this period were working incredibly hard to just deliver that as best as they could. And all the people who now try to sort of say, "Oh, no, no, you were trying to contract for this." It's just all total rubbish. I mean, you got there is no other description of it. On the 8th, I think it was the 8th of December, you where that that first vaccine was administered and you went on TV and got very you cried. I did. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Talk to me about that day and those feelings and what was going through your mind. Well, that was it was incredibly emotional. It was because because we'd put everything into this and the very first vaccine down the track, so to speak, had worked, right? We bought six vaccines, uh, including the Oxford one. Um, actually, one of them only got approved about two weeks ago. And imagine if, you know, imagine if that that had been the
case for all six. So the fact that the very first one sailed through and has worked brilliantly and then the Oxford one like the home the home um uh vaccine that also has gone brilliantly although the you know there's a load of noise and the politics of it and the Europeans getting shirty but on a clinical basis has been amazing. Um and um so on the 8th of December the first person receives it and this is the way out of this terrible situation that we're all in and all these people had died and I knew that science was going to save us. But that wasn't the worst. You know that was then the problem was at the same time you know we were having the second wave getting really big. So it was a really mixed period because we had the the the joy that the vaccine was working but at the same time you know cases growing and um I was on I was on Good Morning Britain um and I hadn't seen the image you know the video of Margaret Keenan getting I'm sure you're thinking of it now right we can all remember it and I had but I hadn't seen that image and they showed the image and I completely lost it and I was I was in floods of tears and totally lost control of my um of my of my body and my voice. Um and then I tried to pull it together and they said in my ear, you know, we're coming back to you in five. And um and I tried to pull it together. I just about got it together and then started talking to I think it was Pier Morgan again. And on Twitter they were like, "This guy's making it up. He's not authentic. He was just trying to cry." The honest truth was if they'd come back to me like 5 seconds earlier, I would have been in a complete mess. And I was trying to hold myself together. And maybe maybe as politicians we do that too often. I was maybe I should have just been more relaxed about it because I got a load of abuse for looking inauthentic because I was trying to sort of be professional and um and and and and not cry. Well, for me that was actually the first time that I thought you you did have empathy. I know that, right? Because because I I've said on this podcast which you've listened to, I said that I thought you were an emotionless robot and I genuinely outrageous
genuine just being honest like I genuinely like genuinely I I've I think Justinda in New Zealand has felt much more I don't know like human and emotional and I think that gives gives me as a muggle as a normal person a sense that they understand me. So when I see politicians being a bit straightfaced and tough, you know who was really good at that, Barack Obama. He would cry after Sandy Hook and these these kids shootings, he would just cry. He would stand there in front of the nation and he would cry. And it made me realize that he felt the same way that I did. Whereas I the reason I said you were I thought you were an emotionless robot. And I know you heard it was because I'd never seen that. And part of the reason I'll be honest and I got to be fair part of the reason I'd never seen that is because you're put in situations where they are trying to always just get you like 5 10 minutes. Well that's that's part of the defensive. Yeah. So one of the things I've learned without a shadow of a doubt is that you've just you've got to um you've just got to let that show. And I f you know as a I find that um I find it hard. Um and um you just got to let that emotion show more. Um and and and just just try to be just try to say it as you feel it. Um the podium doesn't help. All right. The very formal communication method, you know, two Union Jacks Oak background. Um the so the podium doesn't always help to because it puts that a barrier in place. But then you mentioned Barack Obama and you know he stood stood the podium wasn't a problem for him but he extraordinary communicator right he is extraordinary. You said you find it hard to show that emotion. Yeah. Because the my the natural instinct when you're under especially when you're under pressure and questioning is to say is to sort of uh go go alpha male. isn't always the best answer. I think that is a problem with politics. I think that um I think that the political leaders that probably will end up doing really well. And I don't honestly I don't see this on either side of the aisle.
But, you know, because because I'm relaxed now in the way that we're talking, there'll probably be something on Mail Online tomorrow. You know, Hancock's in such and such a screw up, right? It because that's how I don't know what it is. I mean, we've been talking for so long, but I I there is there will be um that is how the media reacts. And so you and so once you once you once you're kind of experienced in seeing that reaction, right, you also then it tempers how you talk. So actually coming in, one of the reasons I wanted to come in and talk to you was because I want to just talk freely and I don't care if that is on, you know, item 10 of the mail online tomorrow. Um, I'm just trying to answer the questions as best I can and I I genuinely think that is a better way of of communicating in politics and it's definitely something that I've learned. Yeah. And it's something that I' I've just seem to be so absent on both sides of the aisle is um a real sincere feeling of like empathy and I think that makes politicians feel like they're not us. Yeah. More distant. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No. And there ends up being a language of politics. Yeah. and and some people thinking that they don't understand the code of you know it's as if it's a a code and you know there is a um and it's just it's not helpful because it puts a a barrier up. I work really hard at trying to do that. That's why I was so upset when I heard you say somebody I really respect saying that I'm an emotional wreck or what not emotional the opposite emotionist robot. Thanks. No, I gota be honest. No, but honestly for me for me that it's it's important to say because a it's what I said and what I felt and and b it's actually not just you. It's generally like the politics as as a whole. I'm like what I see in normal people is real empathy. And do you know do you know the other thing is it's language. Yeah. When you when you when you do those interviews on Good Morning Britain or whatever Yeah. the language is not human language. It's very political and very controlled. And I I think PR training is honestly a c politics I work so hard not to do that
political training but but it is and it's but it's in particular in response to the aggressive questions right so you you have not asked any aggressive questions you've asked insightful questions instead but when you're on you know when you get D type question you give the D type answer yeah and that and I think that's the issue is how do we get to a state where politicians go you know what that was a bit of a mistake and hindsight's a wonderful You know, I'll tell I'll say I'll tell you a story. Um the first time I did any questions uh when I was new in parliament um I um you go for a meal before you do any questions and um Nigel Farage was on as well and he had two pints and I and I said to him like you have two pints before going on any question he said yeah cuz otherwise I can't talk freely and um I sat next to him and he managed to get every single question to answer to an answer about why awful why uh Europe was awful. Um and um but he just absolutely, you know, he he had a couple of pints and and he sounded like he'd had a couple of pints. Now um I don't you know, whatever you think of his politics, his ability to communicate in a relaxed way and I remember thinking every time I then saw him, that was years before the referendum, every time I saw like you obviously been drinking. I mean maybe maybe that's one way to but I I feel like it shouldn't have to. I think that the the the people that are really going to resonate with the the public are going to be the normal people that break through without political PR training. Yeah. I think they'll resonate way more with people. I think Obama was he felt like one of them to me. I know people some people hate him and there's lots of things with drones and whatever, but he felt like someone in the way he spoke that I could relate to because I felt the sincere emotion. I don't really get that from Boris. I don't necessarily feel like Boris has the same. And then we go back to Oh, I disagree. I disagree with that. I think that one of the reasons that Boris um relates to people and people relate to him is because he he doesn't speak in as you call it political speak. Um one of the reasons he is such an effective communicator whether you agree with him
or not um is that uh is that he he he doesn't play by those rules. I I I understand what you're saying. He doesn't he didn't entirely feel like a politician. to come back to this question about you know when we were talking about at the start about people's backgrounds. Yeah. Right. Um you know Boris has a background as different from the voters of Heartleyool as it's possible to get. Um but you know he can he can reach people and I think that's actually I think he's a good I put him in the Barack Obama category actually. Really? Yeah. Yeah. For people of a different politics. Yeah. I would because um he because he's one of the few people who who could who really just um you will withstand the sort of criticism of the of the next days press in order to try to actually say how he feels. He's a very very um emotionally engaged person. Let's talk about some of the stuff that you haven't really been able to speak about at length which was in September 2020 we there was laws established that well not laws but there was guidance given to stop us engaging within um having casual sex with people outside of our household etc etc right do you think you can answer ask the question in a little bit more respectful way so in September 2020 you said this is what you said um established couples should be shouldn't be having sex there should be boundaries you warned against casual text advising the public to stick to well established relationships and joking I know I'm in an established relationship and you told us to remember the basics of hands face space and and throughout that period hugging was not I remember you saying that you were looking forward to hugging your mom in um the 17th of May and then all of this stuff comes out with the son the CCTV leak and everything in between. Yeah, there's a there's obvious Can we just start this section again? How how would you like to start it? I don't mind all of it except the opening bit about casual sex. I haven't had casual sex with anybody. I fell in love with somebody and we're gonna and let me ask the question and you can correct the question. Right. So there's
there's all of this stuff which what I'm saying is from there. Well, let's start this bit again and I'll and I'll relax. Okay, fine. But you've got to let me ask the question. This is what we do here. We just we just talk. There's no this isn't Yeah, but you've got you've researched a bit about casual sex. I'm not I've not even asked the question yet. Okay, let's do get to that bit. So in September 2020, you said that when when asked that established couples um only established couples should be having sex. There needs to be boundaries. You want to No. No. Okay. So um those rules Yeah. were not in place. That was that was advice on TV. Yeah. But those rules were not in place when this all this happened. So there's a way that we can do this bit of the conversation, but we cannot do it with you starting talking about casual sex. Can can I ask the question? You can ask a question, but let's ask a question in a reasonable way. Okay, so I'm going to ask a question. Just this bit is really hard for me as well. I I completely understand. I completely understand. I actually haven't asked the question yet. This is all just a preamble. No, no, it's not. I What the point The point that's been leveled at you is very simple. It's that there's a contradiction in what you said and how you behaved. That's what that's what I totally get that bit. So, can I ask that question? Yeah, go for it. So, the point that's been leveled at you is there's a contradiction in how you behaved. Yeah. Versus what the guidance you were giving as health secretary. Yes. This is not a revelation. I mean, this is not a revelation. Exactly. This is what everyone's been saying. Hugging was advised against, you know, distance. There was this whole hands, face, space thing which we were all told to obey. Yeah. and couples were um when when when asked you were said to stick within well-established
relationships and you jokingly said I know I'm in an established relationship then this CCTV stuff comes out my question is you know you talked earlier on about funerals and people going through immense hardship people say you you were a contradiction what's your response to that how do you how do you receive all of that when everyone this is what everyone says this is not Steve has said it for the first time it's what the whole world is saying at you this is the central thing. Yeah. And this is ultimately why you resigned. That is my absolute That is my response. So I resigned because I broke the social distancing guidelines. Yeah. Um by then they weren't actually rules. They weren't the law, but that's not the point. The point is they were the guidelines that I'd been proposing. And you know that happened because I fell in love with somebody and you know I I've known Gina for more than half of my life and we first actually worked together on student radio um back in the Oxford days and um I brought her into the department to help with public communications in the same way we brought loads of brilliant people in who were experts in their field. Um, and so we spent a lot of time together, ironically, trying to, you know, get me to be able to communicate in a more emotionally intelligent way. And and and we fell in love and, you know, that's something that that was completely outside of my control. Um, and I of course I I regret the, you know, the the pain that that's caused and the very very very public nature. You know, anybody who's been through this knows how difficult it is, how painful it is. Doing that in public is incredibly painful. And um, but but you know, I I fell in love with someone. You did you fall in love while working together? Yeah. Okay. So, you know, nobody, you know, we we it all happened quite it all happened quite quickly. It actually happened after this
sort of thing stopped being after the rules were lifted. Um but the guidance was still in place. So, I'm not trying to claim that, you know, I hold no bitterness about about this because um I broke the rules. You know, I fess up. I broke um the uh the guidance. Um and you know, there were only two people responsible for this. Um and and and ultimately that's why I resigned. I I took responsibility for my decision and I resigned. Um when that CCTV stuff happens, and I'm not going to go into the details of cuz I I don't want to drag people into this, but I want to understand how that feels. I can only imagine having dealt with a pandemic and then getting this call from the sun that they're about to leak something. Yeah. I for me this is the this is the I would I don't like I don't have the words to describe how that must have all felt but tell me when you get that call it was it was it was awful um it was awful because you know we obviously knew what was going on. Um, but we wanted to uh to to do this as unpainfully as possible and by and by the release of those images obviously that caused a huge amount of pain and um the uh and and it was it's it's it's been I mean anybody knows anybody knows how difficult it is it you know ending a ending a relationship ship. Um, and we have six children. You know, it's it tough, but you know, um, Junior and I love each other very deeply. And, um, what where are we? 7, eight months later, it gets gets a bit easier with time. Um and um but I have no sort of I don't hold it against anybody because I was because you know we were I take responsibility. Have have they figured out where that footage came from? Yeah. You know so many people asked me this question. Everyone's asked the question and um do you know my honest the honest feeling I have in response to that question is I just don't care. Right.
the actually there's there's a funny story which is that um the best I know is that it was one of the um security guards in the department. Um there's a current ICO investigation. I don't know any of the details of that investigation. I haven't got any inside information other than that which is public. However, the investigation uh is based on a law, data protection law that I took through parliament into which I personally put a journalistic exemption. So, I'm I I don't hold it against um the against the journalists for publishing it. Um but obviously, you know, it was a very serious data data protection breach, if you like. The thing that re we've learned and I think all my other colleagues in cabinet learned immediately is why did you have a CCTV in the Secretary of State's office? Obviously, I didn't know about it. Um and um because even who's in the office is a is a is an important fact and a and a sensitive pieces of information. Um but all of that is by them by because you know it is not the responsibility of others that um that those social distancing guidelines were broken. You know that is that is my responsibility and I took responsibility for having done that. You took responsibility. You went to Boris. You said you know you'd apologized to him and he considered the matter closed and then that's kind of where people thought it had been left off. But then I think the pre the media noise and the pressure built and eventually the narrative is that you then resigned after yeah after 24 48 hours. It wasn't really after the um wasn't really the press. It was that, you know, some people I really respect got in contact and told me about things that they had been not able to do like what um like you know seeing dying relatives and you know even though it you know and and and I and I realized that it was it was unsustainable. Would you class that as the the worst time of your life? Being health secretary is not nearly as difficult as worrying about your children in a very public divorce. Um,
undoubtedly this, you know, going through that is undoubtedly the hardest thing I've ever done by a long, long way. And as as you go forward on that particular situation, what's your like strategy? Because you've come from a home where your parents weren't they they they'd broken up, right? So what's your what's your strategy going forward now to to try to mend to try to be kind to try to to try to um um to try to make you know on the fact obviously try to make things better. Um, and then on the professional side, you know, I've got a other things I'm interested in. I actually don't miss the job as much as I expected, right? I'm I actually I I'm really enjoying the freedom of being on the back benches on the professional side. And um I'm I'm, you know, I'm I'm absolutely, you know, um I'm absolutely in love with Gina. And that that helps a bit. a lot of the um since you've departed the front the front bench there's uh I mean now there's there's a lot of party gate stuff going on and yeah it's kind of almost reminiscent of your situation because the the claim level the government is that there was a contradiction there was all these parties going on into 10 10 Downing Street sounds like it was bit of a nightclub while the rest of the nation is was were locked down and obeying the rules you've not really been brought into that as much I wasn't invited you weren't invited But what's your what's your take on that? What's your because I'm sure you get asked about this. Well, that's obviously very difficult. Um, but I do think you've got to look at the big picture of, you know, we're coming out of the pandemic now and that's in part in large part because of the the big calls. But you resigned when when you had the I I'll be honest, you had the decency to say, "Right, I have been a contradiction here and I've let people down." So, you resigned. But yeah, but you know the prime minister
has so many other things on his plate as well, right? He's got Russia, Crimeir, and he's got uh the um you know, getting out of the pandemic. That was a big call, especially the response to Omicron, getting that right and coming through first. So, he's got all these other big things on his plate. What do you make of um I don't really have much to talk about on this particular topic, but this all this Dominic Cumins stuff. He's become a very interesting character, bit of a whistleblower, exposer type. And you know, you're you've been supportive of Boris Johnson pretty much the whole way, even as you say with the party gate stuff. You said, "We need to look at the bigger picture." But he released some text messages that apparently are very critical of you where Boris said that you you [ __ ] up ventilators and that you're totally [ __ ] hopeless. Yeah. But remember at that time it subsequently transcribed that Dominic Cummings was trying to get me fired. And if you look at those text exchanges, they're like a dire tribe against what I was up to, right? And um that didn't actually reflect what was going on. So, you know, the the Boris has apologized for uh the way that came over, but actually if you um and for you know, for sending those messages, but actually if you look at it in context, the context is this guy was trying to get me fired. He sent a load of um aggressive messages to the prime minister. the prime minister responded as he did in a private setting never expecting that to become public. So um I'm completely you know what what you know there are there are there are people who really want to fix things and improve things in life and um uh and uh I'd rather be that type of person. Speaking of fixing things, yeah, one of the things you're really focused on fixing at the moment, and I've seen you talk about this in Parliament and in several other places in a lot of the interviews you're doing in Twitter, is this issue of dyslexia in our country. Tell me why you you alluded to it earlier why this is personal to you. So, so I was only identified as dyslexic at university and I know despite really good teachers, it would have been so much easier for me because before I was
identified, I just thought I was stupid and and bad at English. And some people say you shouldn't identify, you know, you shouldn't tell dyslexic kids they're dyslexic because then they'll be labeled. But I labeled myself as as as as useless with words and kids do that. But still today only one in five children are identified at school. And I think this is ridiculous especially in a world where you can have online assessments that can't then they can't give you the formal diagnosis but they can give you the data that says this person's this child's highly unlikely to highly likely to be dyslexic. So I'm campaigning for that. And in a way it's one of these things that you know now that I've got I can choose how I spend my time as a backbencher. This is something I really care about. I never got round to doing it in government. I actually had assembled a little team to push on this in the department for health after the election before but those people got moved on to have to deal with the pandemic. So for me this is unfinished business and for the you know hundreds of thousands of dyslexic kids out there. If I can show them, if I can show just one of them that you can you can succeed as a dyslexic person and you can make it so long as you get the support you need, as long as you get, you know, you get identified um then then that will have been worth it. So it really really matters to me and I I'm sure we can make loads of progress. when you when we talked about you having this conversation with me here, there was I remember you saying there was things that had been said that you wanted to kind of have a chance to address and rebuttal. Do you feel like you've had a chance to address and rebuttal those things? Yeah, I have. Um I feel like, you know, because we've have been able to have a long conversation, you know, there's a few of those um a few things I've been able to explain explain the thinking behind. Um but I also hope that we can have a proper um debate about how this is how the pandemic side is dealt with properly in the future and um we can learn learn the lessons as best we can and I think that's important. Every guest in this podcast you be aware of this tradition leaves a question in the diary of a CEO and I don't read it
and I swear on my I swear on all my family that I that I don't read it until I open the book. So, forgive me if I takes me some time to read the handwriting. Okay, here we go. So, the last guest on the Driver podcast left this question for you. If you were lying on your deathbed, what three things would you want to have achieved in life? Oh, well, that's great. Three things. Three things you would want to have achieved in your life. Pretty ambitious. Um, the number one is I want my children to be happy and and and have fulfilling lives. That is that is Undoubtedly number one. The second is that I will have want I want to have a happy and loving and fulfilling um life and relationship, you know, for the rest of my days on just because of what's happened with Gina. Gina's actually here today. It's worth saying. Yeah, that's okay to say that. Um because of what's happened, I'm guessing it's made it's the scrutiny around because relationships are hard already. Yeah. But the the context and the scrutiny around that what's happened must I can't make it easier we've been through a lot together um and you know that's the that's the joyous bit that's the easy bit there's a lot of you know there's a lot of very difficult things that I have to deal with um you know and um having fallen in love with Gina is the that's the easy And the third one and the third one um I hope that I hope to have I mean it's sort of both it's so obvious um but it and I'm going to put some I'm going to try to answer it more specifically. Um I hope to have improved the country that I love. Um and you know if for instance that is making sure that every single dyslexic child gets both the the capability to read and write and um be effective and the self-esteem that comes with that then that would be that would be wonderful and I'm lucky to have a platform in parliament um and through the fact that I'm fairly well known to be able to to um to try to affect change and that's
what I want to do. Thank you. Thank you for both your time because I know it's in tremendous demand, but also thank you for choosing to have this conversation here. These conversations aren't easy, so it's often easy to easier to avoid them. And you know, we talked about the importance of emotion and relatability in politics. So, I want to thank you for taking the time to have a conversation where you didn't set any restrictions on me, my line of questioning at all, and you let me ask the questions, which as a quite naive person who isn't polit um really political um would have. And I think that's a credit to you, and I I I thank you for that. And um yeah, well, thanks for giving me the chance. I don't think you're naive at all. You're self- knowing, and you know, that's the most important thing to know. Well, thank you, man. Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. [Music]