DRIVING INTO A CRISIS: CUMMINGS TIMELINE
March 18: Boris Johnson says whole households need to self-isolate at home if anybody has a high temperature or new cough. March 23: The Prime Minister plunges the country into lockdown with strict travel restrictions and the message: ‘Stay at home.’ March 27: Dominic Cummings is seen running out of Downing Street after learning his wife Mary Wakefield had ‘vomited and felt like she might pass out’. He returned to work later that day as she ‘felt a bit better’ and did not have the two key symptoms. But that evening he drove his wife and child 260 miles to Durham fearing they may have already caught the virus and would need child care. They arrived around midnight after a non-stop journey. March 28: Mr Cummings wakes up with Covid-19 symptoms and is bedridden. March 30: Downing Street confirms Mr Cummings has coronavirus symptoms and is self-isolating.
Night of April 2: Mr Cummings’s son wakes up ‘distressed’ and with a ‘bad fever’ and is taken to hospital by ambulance. Mr Cummings stayed behind as he ‘could barely stand up’. April 3: The following morning their son seems ‘back to normal’. Mr Cummings drives to hospital to take him back to the cottage.
April 5: A neighbour allegedly sees Mr Cummings in his parents’ Durham garden with his son, and later recounts the sighting to the Mirror and Guardian newspapers. The Guardian contacts No 10 and is provided with a ‘no comment’ response. Yesterday Mr Cummings said he was well enough to walk in nearby private woods owned by his father at this time. April 11: Mr Cummings is now tired but symptom-free and is given medical clearance to return to work. April 12: (Easter Sunday): Mr Cummings is spotted in Barnard Castle, a 30-mile drive from his parents’ home. He said the journey was to check his eyesight was good enough to complete the return journey to London. He said while there they sat by the River Tees for 15 minutes. On the way back to the cottage, their son needed the toilet. They all got out of the car and went into ‘some woods’ and ‘played for a little bit’ before continuing their journey. April 13: Mr Cummings drives his wife and son back to London. April 14: Mr Cummings is seen back at work in Downing Street. April 19: Unnamed witness claims seeing Mr Cummings out
walking with his wife in Houghall Woods, near his parents’ farm in Durham. Mr Cummings said yesterday reports that he returned to Durham after April 13 were ‘false’. May 22: The Mirror and Guardian newspapers break the news that Mr Cummings is said to have broken strict lockdown rules by visiting his parents’ home in early April.
May 25: Mr Cummings spells out his reasons for travelling to Durham in an unprecedented Downing Street press conference, saying he would not have access to childcare for the couple’s four-year-old son if they had stayed in London. He insists he ‘acted reasonably’, does not regret his actions and had not offered to resign.