Welsh Labor’s first minister has blamed Brexit and Westminster’s lack of funding on Covid failures.
Mark Drakeford told the Covid Inquiry that the UK Government “didn’t give us any money at all” for the additional responsibilities devolved to the Welsh Government in recent years, which included its pandemic response plans.
The inquiry heard that in 2018 the Welsh Government was given responsibility for a number of functions which then sat with UK ministers.
This included running its own ‘risk register’, a document that provides information to the public about the ‘most significant risks’ the government has assessed.
But Mr Drakeford said this ‘transfer of functions’ to the Welsh Government was not ‘accompanied by a transfer of funding’ as would typically occur.
“So funds had to be found from wider Welsh Government sources that would otherwise have been used for other purposes,” he said.
“No additional funding for new positions”
Mr Drakeford said he had created eight new positions in the Welsh Government to “enable us to carry out these new responsibilities”.
“But they were funded – not with new money as one would expect – but with money that was already devolved to Wales for the functions that the Welsh government already had.
Asked if additional funding would have resulted in additional staff to manage the pandemic response plan, Mr Drakeford said: “[That is a] very difficult question to be sure, considering they didn’t give us any money at all. We would have cut our coat according to our fabric.
Hugo Keith, KC, lead solicitor at the inquiry, told Mr Drakeford that his government had pushed for the new powers, and had therefore ‘presumably’ assured the Welsh Government was ‘ready to carry out the new functions he would be authorized to perform”.
Concerned about Brexit fallout
Mr Drakeford, later in his testimony on Tuesday, said that when he became Prime Minister in 2018 – the same year the Welsh Government took control of its risk register – he had been concerned about the fallout from the Brexit, which dominated his first cabinet meeting.
He told the inquest: “Four days after becoming Prime Minister, almost all of our Cabinet meeting was devoted to preparations for leaving the EU without a deal.
“The system was already turning its gaze very firmly to a danger that was right in front of you.”
Vaughan Gething, the former Welsh health minister and current economy minister, also gave evidence to the inquiry and admitted to not reading a number of documents relating to pandemic preparedness and is rather based on briefings.
Mr Gething acknowledged, when asked about several key documents he had not read at the time of the pandemic, the Welsh framework for the management of major infectious disease emergencies, the pan- Welsh and Welsh Government Risk Register.
Asked if he could have done more as health minister to prepare for a pandemic, Mr Gething said: “Looking back, I think it’s fair to say that if I had devoted more ministerial time to this, I could well have accelerated preparation.
Andrew RT Davies, the leader of the Welsh Tories, said: ‘As is clear from the evidence of former Labor health minister Vaughan Gething, he had not read any of the relevant documents in order to put a plan in place. in the event of a pandemic.
“Drakeford’s deflection tactics won’t cut the mustard. The failure to adequately prepare Wales for the pandemic falls squarely on the doorstep of the Senedd Labor Ministers.
“Remember Keir Starmer points to Wales as a model for how he would run the UK government.”
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