Cabinet Office ‘gave military cold shoulder’ over aid offer
THE Cabinet Office has been accused of giving the military the “cold shoulder” by refusing to admit it needed help with the coronavirus crisis.
Sir Iain Duncan Smith, the former Conservative leader, is one of a number of senior Tory MPS who have accused the Cabinet Office of alienating the military in a bid “to keep it too much inside the public sector”.
“I called for the military to be brought in from day one of this crisis,” Sir Iain told The Daily Telegraph. “The civil servants were really reluctant to bring them in.” Sir Iain said throughout the crisis the military had been given the “cold shoulder” by civil servants and that, as a result, areas such as procurement and distribution of PPE and setting up testing labs had seen public bodies “shown up”.
“Their planning is shockingly bad,” he said. “The only body that exists in the UK that constantly plans for disaster is the military, so why not bring them in from the start?”
It is understood that a number of generals are “furious” that the military has not been more involved in the pandemic, while others have questioned why Gen Sir Nick Carter, the head of the Army, has only been invited to speak at one of Downing Street’s daily coronavirus briefings.
Ben Wallace, the Defence Secretary, has not spoken at any of the briefings. A government spokesman said: “The UK’S Civil Service and Armed Forces have a long history of working side by side across a wide range of emergencies, crises and national events, and share experience and expertise in handling these issues.”