‘Those hands that clapped have slapped us in the face’
‘COWARDLY’ JOHNSON UNDER FIRE FOR CARE HOME COMMENTS
BORIS JOHNSON has been accused of slapping care home workers in the face after he blamed them for not following procedures during the pandemic.
The prime minister faced a storm of criticism yesterday over ‘cowardly’ comments despite denials from the government that he was holding the sector responsible for the 20,000 plus Covid-19 deaths recorded in care homes so far.
It came after Mr Johnson told reporters on Monday that ‘too many care homes didn’t really follow the procedures’.
Nadra Ahmed, who chairs the National Care Association, urged the PM to apologise, saying she was ‘absolutely stunned’ by his claim.
She told Sky News: ‘When you think they stood clapping and talked about social care in the way that they did, they have used those same hands to slap across the face of social care.’
Asked what Mr Johnson meant by the remarks, his official spokesman said: ‘Care homes have done a brilliant job under very difficult circumstances.
‘The prime minister was pointing out that nobody knew what the correct procedures were because the extent of asymptomatic transmission was not known at the time.’ Business secretary Alok Sharma echoed the spokesman’s remarks, telling BBC Breakfast that ‘we have done our best to put our arms around the care home sector’.
In the Commons, health secretary Matt Hancock said care homes had done ‘amazing work’ during the crisis and rejected Labour calls to apologise for the PM’s remark.
But Mark Adams, chief executive of the charity Community Integrated Care, said he was ‘unbelievably disappointed’ by Mr Johnson’s allegation.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘I think this – at best – was clumsy and cowardly, but if this is genuinely his view, we’re almost entering a Kafkaesque alternative reality where the government set the rules, we follow them, they don’t like the results and they then deny setting the rules and blame the people trying to do their best.’
The National Care Forum said Mr Johnson’s remarks were ‘frankly hugely insulting’ to care workers. Executive director Vic Rayner told BBC Newsnight that care homes followed the guidance ‘to the letter’ but the government’s attention was focused on hospitals.
In the House of Lords, communities minister Lord Greenhalgh admitted that the guidance given to care homes during the early stages of the pandemic was ‘not as clear as it could have been’.