3. Dr Ben Warner

DR BEN WARNER (affirmed).

Questions From Counsel to the Inquiry

Mr O’Connor: Dr Warner, do take a seat. Could you give us your full name, please.

Dr Ben Warner: Ben Warner.

Counsel Inquiry: Dr Warner, you have kindly prepared a statement at our request, which is up on screen, and it runs to some 80 or so pages. I know that you’ve read it through before you became here today, and there are a couple of very small amendments that you want to make to it, which I’m not going to ask you about because they really are very minor indeed.

With those amendments having been made, are you confident that the contents of this statement are true to the best of your knowledge and belief?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.

Dr Warner, you are by training a scientist, are you not?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: In fact, you describe in your witness statement that you took a PhD in molecular physics?

Dr Ben Warner: Close enough, yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Thank you. And that having obtained that qualification, you undertook post doctoral research at engineering and – at the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council?

Dr Ben Warner: That’s the title of the research fellow, the fellowship was at University College London.

Counsel Inquiry: Thank you. Thereafter, and we’re on or about 2015 now, you worked for a data science company run by your brother, Marc Warner; is that right?

Dr Ben Warner: Mark co-founded it with a number of other people, and he is the CO, yes.

Counsel Inquiry: And you work there?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: We don’t need to go into the detail of your work there, but you refer in your witness statement to machine learning being one of the matters at least that you focused on at that stage?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: You also say that in parallel, so at the time after 2015 that you were working with your brother, you were also advising both government and also the commercial sector on data science, artificial intelligence, matters like that?

Dr Ben Warner: As part of my work as an employee of Faculty, I advised government FTSE 100 companies and fast growth start-ups, as it says in my witness statement.

Counsel Inquiry: I see. So it was at that time but I was perhaps wrong to say it was in parallel –

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: – it was part of your job?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.

So moving forward a little bit in the chronology, then, you say that you were recruited to work at Number 10 immediately following the December 2019 election?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Is it right that you were recruited by Dominic Cummings?

Dr Ben Warner: The conversations I had with were Dominic Cummings, yes.

Counsel Inquiry: And the purpose of your employment, the whole idea was that you would try to push forward the use of analysis and technology in government, drawing no doubt on the experience we’ve just mentioned?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: It is right, isn’t it, that you had worked on the Vote Leave campaign a year or so before the 2019 –

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: – election? And is it right that you therefore knew Dominic Cummings from those days?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Presumably you also knew Boris Johnson as well?

Dr Ben Warner: No.

Counsel Inquiry: Had you not come across him during the Vote Leave campaign?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe I had never – I had never spoken to Dominic – sorry, to Boris Johnson during the Vote Leave campaign.

Counsel Inquiry: Right. And just to finish off on the start, as it were, of your experience in Downing Street, you describe in your statement that you were, as a matter of formality, a special adviser, but you emphasise that it wasn’t your role to advise on political matters in the way that we might normally expect of a special adviser, indeed you say you had no expertise in the wider Westminster political ecosystem; is that right?

Dr Ben Warner: I mean, how I’ve described it in my witness statement is probably the most precise I can be.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. Is that a fair summary that I have just given?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Tell us this: when you started your job, then, in December 2019, how were you expecting it to develop, what were you expecting to be engaged on during your time at Downing Street?

Dr Ben Warner: I treated it like any other engagement that I’ve done previously. Often companies that lack expertise in these areas understandably don’t know the best way to move forward, so the first part was just to learn the sort of state of the landscape at that point in time.

Counsel Inquiry: Of course we’re all conscious of the dates, and within really a month or two of you arriving in Downing Street, the pandemic began and a large amount of your time, not all of it, as you explain in your statement, but a large amount of your time was taken up with matters relating to the pandemic, in summary?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm, I think that over the early period that is true but towards the later period that would not be true.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. And just to be clear you in fact left Downing Street in May of 2021?

Dr Ben Warner: Sorry, I was referring to the later period of my time in Number 10, not the later period of the pandemic.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. So it’s right that you left Downing Street in May 2021?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: So just the point you made, the early period, you mean, shall we say, the first half of 2020?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: And then your involvement from later on in 2020 and early 2021 was reduced?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.

Now, let’s talk, then, about that period for the first half of 2020. And just by way of context you describe in your witness statement in the very early weeks of the year being engaged in other projects. Of course you probably – well, I think you say you had heard of the pandemic starting in China from the scientific press, but it wasn’t a matter of everyday concern for you in early January. You refer, for example, to working on the HS2 project during that period?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: But you did quite shortly thereafter become involved in the day-to-day response to Covid-19, and it may have been that Exercise Nimbus, which took place on 12 February, was the first occasion when you, as it were, had a formal involvement in the sense of an appointment in your diary requiring you to undertake something to do with the pandemic?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, my calendar especially over that early period probably is not a great reflection of my activities, but, like you say, the first calendar that we can show is definitely Covid is that Operation Nimbus exercise.

Counsel Inquiry: As we’ll hear, and we’ll come to this in a bit more detail, after that, so after 12 February, you started to attend scientific committee meetings, for example SAGE, but I think, as we’ll hear, there may have been other committees as well, and so the rhythm of your involvement increased over that period?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Your statement describes, and this is really one of the themes that I want to explore, how you became convinced that the mitigation strategy which we’ve all heard about and which was being pursued at the time was flawed in the sense that, as the understanding of the pandemic developed, you became convinced that it would lead to an NHS – to the NHS being overwhelmed, which would itself cause, greatly increase fatalities; is that right?

Dr Ben Warner: I became convinced the mitigation strategy was the incorrect one, yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Was that at least partly to do with the fact that it would cause NHS overwhelm?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Thank you.

So, as I say, I’d like in a moment to review what you were doing, what took place, the notes you made during that period, with that being at least one of the issues we focus on.

Before I do that, I wanted just to raise a couple of short introductory points. The first, can we go to paragraph 95 of your statement, please, on page 27. It’s the sentence or two at the beginning of that paragraph, Dr Warner, you say:

“It is not necessary to perform large scale simulations of an epidemic to understand the main effects of a mitigation versus a suppression strategy. Simple calculations law allow for reasonable approximations of the outcome, and I would have been carrying out calculations of this type.”

Now, we’ve heard a lot of evidence, Dr Warner, about modelling and we’ve heard about how complicated and, if you like, inaccessible other than to experts those modelling processes can be.

Are you trying to make the point here that one can understand in broad terms things like the difference between the mitigation and the suppression policies, strategies, without actually needing to undertake complicated modelling?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes. I think, you know, the – as discussed in my statement, I’m really talking about reasonably simple epidemiology.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. Just to give a sort of example of the point which you may well be trying to make, can I ask you to look at an email, please. Just to make this clear, this isn’t an email that you were party to at the time it was sent. The Inquiry has already looked at it. It was an email sent in January, on January 25, by Professor Woolhouse –

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: – who the Inquiry has heard from, to Neil Ferguson, who I know you knew at around this time, and also Sir Jeremy Farrar.

We see here that he is sharing some concerns that he had at that early stage about Covid and asking himself the question, “how bad is it going to get”, and referring to what he describes as “2 key numbers” which he had seen in the WHO statement, that is R, the reproduction number, yes?

Dr Ben Warner: Yeah.

Counsel Inquiry: Being 2. And the case fatality rate of 4%. He also refers to a generation time which he said he could make a guess at. And then he says, perhaps if we drop down two paragraphs, he refers to some arithmetic which, as puts it, his undergraduate class could work out with a pocket calculator in a few minutes, and then the paragraph above what that arithmetic is, he says:

“If we take those numbers at face value we quickly get to a ballpark estimate of almost half the people in the UK … getting this infection over a year or so, at least a double being of the gross mortality rate (much more during epidemic peak), and a completely overwhelmed health system.”

Those, of course, were his ballpark calculations, but is that the type of rough calculation that you had in mind in that paragraph of your statement you were –

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, I’m almost certain he is referring to the same equations that I’m talking about.

Counsel Inquiry: Right.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: So we can see there that those sorts of equations give you, if you like, a ready reckoner on likely mortality rates, the likely period an epidemic may last, or a pandemic, and the impact on the NHS; is that fair?

Dr Ben Warner: I’m not sure how you get the timescale of the epidemic, but the other two are true.

Counsel Inquiry: Right. Thank you.

Let’s move on, then, and look back at your own personal involvement, and we can do that, if we may, by going to paragraphs 32 and 33 of your witness statement, to start with, on page 11.

We’ve touched on this, but you describe at – it’s at 33 where you say that the first, as it were, diarised event was this Nimbus exercise. In the paragraph above you say that you very likely came across Covid in meetings or discussions before that but you can’t pin that down now.

So Nimbus on 12 February, you refer to being an observer there, and it was, as we have heard, a ministerial tabletop exercise. Do you remember where it took place?

Dr Ben Warner: In COBR.

Counsel Inquiry: Right. As you say, the objective was to expose ministers to decisions they might be expected to take during a pandemic in the reasonable worst-case scenario.

Now, we’ve heard something about that concept of a reasonable worst-case scenario. What did that term mean to you or does it mean to you?

Dr Ben Warner: At this time or now?

Counsel Inquiry: At the time.

Dr Ben Warner: At the time, I – it’s – I – it … in this meeting, actually, I can’t tell you what I thought it meant.

Counsel Inquiry: Well, let me put it this way: I’m sure you knew that this was supposed to be a “reasonable worst-case scenario”, and that’s in the slides and is – we will see was discussed at the meeting itself. So did you understand that the scenario being discussed was something that was predicted as likely to happen or as something that might happen, perhaps the worst sort of end of the spectrum, or do you not know?

Dr Ben Warner: I can’t speak to that.

Counsel Inquiry: All right.

Let us go, then, to some of the documents that are associated with the Nimbus exercise, and to start with perhaps we can look briefly – because we did look at this document at the end of last week – at the briefing pack, which is INQ00052022.

I’m sure you’ve looked at this document recently, Dr Warner, but do you remember seeing it at the time?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Let’s go, if we can, first of all, to page 7, where we see what’s described as the synopsis, and we will note – we did look at this at the end of last week – first of all, the first bullet point, the notional date was 14 April, so they were projecting it two months ahead, because we know that the exercise was actually on 12 February.

Then there were various details given about what is supposed to have happened by then and what is forecast, and we can see the penultimate bullet point:

“8,500 deaths to date … however there is a lag in data … Case Fatality Rate … of approximately 2.5% of clinical cases (1.25% of the total population).”

And in terms of actual numbers, we see in the last bullet point it’s expected 840,000 excess deaths over the 16-week wave of the infection, assuming – there is that term we discussed – the reasonable worst-case scenario.

Those of course are very high numbers indeed, aren’t they?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: And they must have made an impression on you at the time?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm, as I say, in my statement, most of the – my reaction is in hindsight. I mean, it was a fictional exercise.

Counsel Inquiry: A fictional exercise which was dealing with a very extreme set of factual events.

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t remember more than I put in my witness statement.

Counsel Inquiry: Okay.

Let’s just look over the page, the last page on this document. This summarises the position in graph form rather than in the bullet points on the page before. We see, don’t we, a fairly familiar type peak. Most of it is projected because the April date when the exercise was supposed to be taking place was still in, as it were, the foothills of the development of the pandemic on the scenario at Nimbus; is that fair?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: We see the line. You say in your witness statement that you knew this anyway, but looking at this peak, it’s clear that what is contemplated is some form of mitigation strategy because you don’t see any sense in which the wave is being suppressed, if that is the alternative strategy?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, I do say that. It’s important to recognise that I do say that in hindsight; I don’t remember what I was thinking at the time.

Counsel Inquiry: All right.

Let’s go on, if we may, to another document which in effect is a set of minutes from the exercise, although I’m not sure one actually sees that term used in this document.

Just to be clear, this is actually a document which you exhibited to your statement, along with very many others. I didn’t raise it at the end of last week, and suggested that we hadn’t seen a document of this sort. In fact it had been disclosed, and we did have it. So let’s look at it now.

First of all, could I just pick up on the timing, Dr Warner. You may or may not remember much about this, but it’s quite noticeable that the exercise started at – can you see, that’s right – 16.45, so quarter to 5 in the afternoon? Do you have any memory as to how long it lasted? If it started at that time, one might think it wouldn’t have lasted more than an hour or two, but can you help us at all?

Dr Ben Warner: No. No.

Counsel Inquiry: Let’s look on, then, please. We see a list of attendees, that Matt Hancock was in the chair.

If we go over the page, please, we can see your name on the right-hand side; yes?

Then I’d just like to take you to one or two references, starting on page 3, please, the first numbered paragraph. We see that the exercise was started with what’s described as a “current situation” update, and a little more detail is given about the notional situation than we saw in the slides.

So, for example, we can see an estimate that there could be as many as 1.6 million further cases in the week on which the notional exercise was taking place.

If we go over the page, we see, just again to give us a sense of scale of the type of emergency that was being exercised, paragraph 3:

“DCMO emphasised that the week beginning 13th May may be the peak week and 7.3 million new cases would arise in that week, not including those who had not yet recovered … The expectation was that over the course of the pandemic there would be 33.5 million clinical cases.”

So, as I say, putting some numbers to the broad outlines in the slides.

Clearly, if you like, a population-level pandemic was being contemplated; yes?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Then if we just look further down that page and on to the next couple, we can see that the discussions seem largely to have focused around how such an enormous series of infections were to be dealt with by the various different parts of the state that were represented at the meeting, in particular the NHS.

So, for example, at paragraphs 7 and 8, we see being picked up the point that was raised towards the end of last week about the NHS needing to triage by resource, as it’s put, so not having the capacity to triage or to treat everyone that came through the door, needing to use their resource only on some people.

Paragraph 11, reference to the fact that there would be competition for beds between new patients and old patients; do you see that?

Can I just ask you, do you have much of a memory at this sort of discussion at the exercise, Dr Warner?

Dr Ben Warner: The first thing I’d say is that I don’t – these minutes, I’m not sure I saw at the time. I think if they were referenced in my witness statement, it was a reference to show that I was there, rather than because I have these notes.

My recollections of the exercise as a whole is contained within my statement, that I remember thinking that it was a serious – obviously a massively serious threat, and that I didn’t think this stress tested the government’s plans in any serious way. Past that, I don’t have any extras.

Counsel Inquiry: All right. Well, I’ll just take you to one more reference, in part so that my Lady can see it.

If we can look over two pages, please, to page 6 at paragraph 28, continuing the theme, really, there’s a reference to the Home Office noting the “social consequences of the decisions, effectively rendering it into a ‘survival of the fittest’ situation”.

What we certainly seem to see from these minutes, Dr Warner, and I appreciate you’re saying that this isn’t all in your memory now, but do you agree that, at least looking at these minutes now, it is apparent that what is being discussed is a disaster, a sort of medical disaster which either, in fact, involves the NHS collapsing or at least a situation which is very close to the NHS collapsing?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, in this hypothetical scenario everyone is discussing that.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes, I mean, if you’re talking about fighting over beds and survival of the fittest and so on, that’s in true where you are, isn’t it?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, in this hypothetical scenario.

Counsel Inquiry: Hypothetical, absolutely.

May I direct you to another document, please, which is document INQ000056150, which is a CRIP, and we’ve been taken to page 14 of it, which is the page I wanted to go to. These are the “Lessons Learned”, or at least some of the lessons learned from Exercise Nimbus.

Let me ask you this: did you see this document, do you think, at the time, or –

Dr Ben Warner: No, I can’t speak to it.

Counsel Inquiry: No. Well, let me just show you it, and just casting our eyes over the types of lessons that are identified here, looking on the column numbered 1, “Policy issues for further discussion”, we see, for example, three bullets down:

“Mental health support for those involved in strategic decision making of Covid-19 …

“Consideration of possibility of public unrest …”

If we zoom out we would see that there are other similar considerations in the other columns, for example, at the top of the send column, a need for the Moral and Ethical Advisory Group to advise on the types of decisions that might need to be taken.

The point I wanted to make about this, Dr Warner, and ask you about is that there’s plenty of consideration of unrest and difficult decisions to be taken, but there doesn’t seem to be anything about the fact that the NHS might be collapsing and trying to do anything to stop the NHS collapsing.

Do you remember at all, either at the meeting or afterwards, any discussion about the fact that what had been discussed at the exercise seemed to be a series of events involving the NHS collapsing?

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t remember conversations in the room. As I put in my statement, that I just remember it just being overall not a serious attempt to stress test the government’s response.

Counsel Inquiry: What do you think might have needed to take place if it was going to be such a serious attempt?

Dr Ben Warner: I’m not an expert at war gaming so I don’t think I should speak to that.

Counsel Inquiry: Well, in general terms, I mean, you say it wasn’t a serious attempt to stress test the arrangements, what would you have wished to see or do you really not –

Dr Ben Warner: I think that you’re – it’s not – I’m not an expert in crisis response, I don’t know the right way to do emergency planning or how to stress test these responses. This is the only meeting of this type I’ve ever sat in, therefore I can say to you my opinion at the time but not necessarily the right way to do it.

Counsel Inquiry: No, but your opinion at the time was that it wasn’t a very effective –

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: – or deep exercise?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Let me switch back to this mitigation strategy that was in force at the time and which – and ask you about your understanding of it.

In very broad terms, the purpose of or effect of the mitigation strategy is, is this right, to allow the virus to run through the population in order to acquire herd immunity? Right, okay so far?

Dr Ben Warner: Carry on.

Counsel Inquiry: Well, let me carry on. Where the peak of the curve is reduced so far as possible to mitigate the death toll but not so much as to prevent the population acquiring that herd immunity.

There’s an extra element I want to add, which I know appears in some of your documents rather later in the chronology, and that is the need perhaps to prevent the NHS being overwhelmed.

Did you understand back in February, at the time of Operation Nimbus, that preventing the NHS being overwhelmed was a critical part of the mitigation strategy?

Dr Ben Warner: At this point in time, no, I did not think I did know that.

Counsel Inquiry: Do you think that – applying a certain amount of hindsight, do you think that in fact that was the policy at the time or do you think perhaps it wasn’t?

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t know what the policy at the time was.

Counsel Inquiry: Did it appear to you, at least from the Nimbus exercise, that the need or a need to stop the NHS being overwhelmed was in fact at the top of people’s minds during that exercise?

Dr Ben Warner: I think from the Operation Nimbus slides, you can clearly see that a mitigation strategy is the one that the government is pursuing. Why it is pursuing that I think is not in those slides, and I do not remember further discussion on that.

Counsel Inquiry: You see, one – let me just ask for your reflection on this. One explanation for the fact that, as far as we can see, the exercise doesn’t really seem to have grappled with trying to stop the NHS being overwhelmed, either in the minutes of the meeting or in the lessons learned, may be that it was regarded as something that was perhaps inevitable or at least it couldn’t be stopped and so there was no need to spend time worrying about it. Do you think that might be an accurate description of the view at the time?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that it’s clear from those – the numbers in those graphs that are presented that in the reasonable worst-case scenario the NHS would struggle, and I believe that is actually in the Nimbus slides.

Whether people saw it as inevitable or not, I don’t know. At that time I’m not sure I would have formed a view.

Counsel Inquiry: No. Well, that’s very fair, Doctor, and let’s carry on with the chronology, then, if we may.

Let’s look at your witness statement first, and at paragraph 39, please, on page 12.

You describe here, Dr Warner, that as you were leaving COBR where the Exercise Nimbus had happened, you had a conversation with Patrick Vallance in which you suggested that you should start to attend SAGE meetings. He thought it was a good idea, and thereafter you did regularly attend SAGE meetings.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Why did you suggest that you should attend SAGE meetings?

Dr Ben Warner: I thought that it was a good idea for me to have a better scientific understanding of the pandemic.

Counsel Inquiry: Did you feel at the time that you might be missing something or did you just think, “This is now obviously serious, this is somewhere where I can get more involved”?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that it was about making sure that I had a clear understanding of the current scientific evidence.

Counsel Inquiry: So SAGE meetings you then attended regularly. I think in fact the first one was the next day.

If we can look just to carry on with this theme at paragraph 44, which is over on the next page, thank you, we can see that you only a week or so after that started attending COBR meetings as well.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: You also refer to civil contingencies meetings separately from COBR meetings. What were they?

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t know.

Counsel Inquiry: They may have been sort of occasional, ad hoc civil contingencies meetings, perhaps?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe this might be a quote from the email.

Counsel Inquiry: Right, I see.

Then, I’m not going to take you to passages in your witness statement, but you – is it right that you also attended, first of all, SPI-M meetings?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe I did attend SPI-M meetings, but not to the same frequency of SAGE.

Counsel Inquiry: I see, and what about SPI-B meetings? You do refer in your witness statement to having a meeting with SPI-B. I’m not sure whether you meant that you were a regular attender of their meetings or not.

Dr Ben Warner: I believe I had a couple of conversations with James Rubin. I don’t think I ever attended SPI-B.

Counsel Inquiry: All right.

But in any event, we – it’s fair, I think, to say that from around this period you did start to attend these series of meetings that we have just discussed, certainly SAGE, COBR and some SPI-M meetings?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, although I would – I’m not sure about SPI-M before the – say March 23. My memories of SPI-M is post lockdown.

Counsel Inquiry: Can we take it that your scientific training meant that you were able to engage with, understand the discussions at these meetings?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Were you welcome at them?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Did you act as a conduit between the scientists in these meetings and Number 10 and the people you worked with there?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm … it’s fair to say that, you know, I discussed things with the scientists, but I was also aware that it was important that I did not speak for Patrick or Chris in their roles as CSA or CMO.

Counsel Inquiry: One of the sort of systemic issues that the Inquiry is looking at is how well the system of passing information and views from SAGE and the other committees on the one hand up to the decision-makers in Downing Street worked, and we know that a very key part of that was Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance.

So did you see yourself as being an extra means by which the information could pass from the committees up to Downing Street, or did you in fact make sure that that wasn’t the case?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm, I did not see myself as an extra means. Obviously by listening to SAGE and talking to scientists I had an informed view and I participated in conversations.

Counsel Inquiry: Did you feel at the time that there was in fact any sort of shortfall, or deficit, in the way that information was passing between the committee meetings up into Downing Street?

Dr Ben Warner: Throughout the pandemic I thought that there was a lack of scientific capability within the different teams and groups that I was working with. And that –

Counsel Inquiry: Just pause there for a moment. Do you mean a lack of scientific capability on SAGE or in Downing Street?

Dr Ben Warner: Oh, no, sorry, I meant for – that was the – generally across government. Obviously the people on SAGE are very good at what they do, they are very thoughtful scientists and, as I say in my report, I spent time talking to them to make sure I was as informed as possible as to their views.

Counsel Inquiry: Sorry, I interrupted you, you were saying that you did think there was a lack of scientific understanding in the government departments you were working in?

Dr Ben Warner: In general. And also within the specific instance I do think that within the, you know, let’s call it sort of COBR/Cabinet Office, that I was continually concerned about their understanding of what SAGE was saying and how that was being translated into the documents that were produced for ministers.

Counsel Inquiry: Are you able to give us an example of that sort of concern or episode?

Dr Ben Warner: The reason I speak to that is because I sent an email to that regard in – just after lockdown, for specific instances, but no, I can’t speak to it.

Counsel Inquiry: All right.

Thank you, we may come back to that issue in due course, but let’s take the chronology forward a little bit and go through towards the end of February. Now you are attending regular SAGE meetings, and it’s right, isn’t it, that the picture about how the virus was taking hold in the country was becoming clearer during this period, in particular it was that the view of SAGE that sustained community transmission was present was hardening during the latter half of February?

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t think that’s true.

Counsel Inquiry: Tell us what –

Dr Ben Warner: I think that 2 March SPI-M say it’s likely and it’s almost certain over the next two weeks, but I don’t know if that’s true over the mid to late February period.

Counsel Inquiry: All right, I think there was some – I don’t disagree with your – what you say about early March, but I think there were some earlier references in February where less strong views were expressed on SPI-M.

But be that as it may, the view, certainly the picture was becoming clearer during February. Do you agree with that?

Dr Ben Warner: I … I think that … I think that’s a difficult statement to make without looking at the evidence.

Counsel Inquiry: Let me ask you a different question, which is this time not about the development of the pandemic, but about the question of the NHS and whether it was likely to be able to cope with whatever was coming down the line.

Now, the evidence we’ve heard from a number of scientists on SAGE and also on SPI-M, as you know many of them doubled up, was that it was becoming clear during February that the NHS was likely to be overwhelmed at the peak of the pandemic. For example, Professor Medley used very much those words. He said:

“Throughout February … it became increasingly clear that NHS capacity in the UK would be overwhelmed.”

You were at the SAGE meetings, perhaps not the SPI-M meetings that early; is that something that you picked up from those meetings?

Dr Ben Warner: Apologies, are you talking about the reasonable worst-case scenario or a central forecast?

Counsel Inquiry: A central forecast.

Dr Ben Warner: I’m not sure there was a central forecast at this point.

Counsel Inquiry: No, well, that’s rather the point. It may be that it wasn’t set down as a central forecast, but it was the view that was being formed by the members of the committee. You were there, I wonder whether you picked that up in discussions at the time or not?

Dr Ben Warner: I have no memory of that, I’m afraid.

Counsel Inquiry: Because one of the issues with both certainly SPI-M and SAGE is that the consensus statements that emerged and were then passed on to Downing Street and other government departments perhaps didn’t capture the full depth of view being developed on those committees.

Now, to take this as an example, this is something that we asked Professor Medley about, because we looked at the SPI-M and SAGE minutes and they didn’t reveal the type of view that he was expressing about the NHS during February.

Do you think, either in that instance or others, that the consensus statements, the minutes, didn’t fully reflect the discussions being held?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm, I … I don’t know if I was seeing the minutes at this point, and I also don’t remember the minutes at this point.

Counsel Inquiry: Do you have any memory at all of a developing view about whether the NHS would be able to cope with the approaching pandemic during February?

Dr Ben Warner: I remember discussions about the sort of developing evidence around the virus, about whether, you know – obviously case fatality rate is not the number that matters, right, it’s the infections fatality rate, and that is a hard number to estimate, and I remember people talking about that, talking about the fact that actually it was like there was asymptomatic transmission.

I think that a large number of these numbers, once, as you pointed out at the start, put into these simple equations, inferred that the NHS would be overwhelmed, but I do not think I ever saw a central forecast at this time.

Counsel Inquiry: Well, it’s very much that sort of soft inference rather than a hard-edged forecast that I want to ask you about, Dr Warner.

Let me take you to a few of your documents relating to this period. We can actually start by going to paragraph 52 of your statement. Yes, we have it there. You refer at the bottom of the page to a SAGE meeting on 27 February. Do you see that?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: And you refer there to the planning assumptions: in the reasonable worst-case scenario 80% of the UK population become infected with an overall 1% fatality rate.

Now, your notes of this meeting you have provided, and perhaps we can look at those, it’s INQ000215664, please. Perhaps we could just introduce these, Dr Warner. I’m going to take you to a passage in these notes in a moment, but you have, I think – you had a habit of keeping a notebook with you when you were at meetings, and you obviously kept them, and in preparing your statement you have gone back to them and done the best you can, because we don’t always see dates on the pages, to identify which notes refer to which meetings. Is that right?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: So if we can go to page 17, please, you say in your statement that, having done that exercise, you think these are the notes that relate to this meeting on the 27th that we were just discussing.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: First of all, at the top of the page, we see:

“Case fatality 2%

“Infection rate …”

Do you mean the infection fatality rate there, of 1%?

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t know. I mean –

Counsel Inquiry: That is –

Dr Ben Warner: – that’s my note.

Counsel Inquiry: Or it’s the overall fatality rate of 1% which you have referred to in your witness statement.

In any event, just looking a couple of lines down, can you see the reference to “80% infection” and “40% symptoms”?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Does that suggest a discussion about asymptomatic infection at that point?

Dr Ben Warner: Looking at that, I think that this is a discussion of the reasonable worst-case scenario.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. But help us, is the distinction between a certain proportion with infection –

Dr Ben Warner: Sorry.

Counsel Inquiry: – and a lower proportion with symptoms, does that suggest there was a discussion about asymptomatic –

Dr Ben Warner: Apologies, what I meant by that was that it’s likely that the document that’s being talked about at that time will refer to this, so rather than going to my notes, you – I would say – suggest that that document will give you actually what it was. But yes, I agree with that, that this is saying that probably half the people infected show symptoms and the other half are asymptomatic, yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. Well, obviously one of the things the Inquiry is interested in is how early on in the chronology of all of this asymptomatic transmission was being taken seriously. Help us, is this something that you think was discussed as something that was likely to be happening or something that only might be happening?

Dr Ben Warner: I can’t speak, you know, that clearly, but I believe that the asymptomatic transmission was always part of the conversations of Covid. However, obviously, you know, human memory as it is, but this definitely points to that as well.

Counsel Inquiry: Right, thank you.

Then just lastly on this page, let’s just look towards the bottom. Yes. So we see in square brackets there “NHS fucked in any scenario”; do you see that?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: And I’ll ask you about that, but before I do, can we go over the page, because there is one other reference which may be driving at the same thing or it may not be. Do you see four lines down it says “long peak over health capacity”?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Help us, it would seem at any rate that both of those references perhaps are to concerns about the NHS being overwhelmed?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe that it says this in the reasonable worst-case scenario document that SAGE is discussing, they say that in these reasonable worst-case scenarios the NHS is overwhelmed.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes.

Perhaps we can go back to the previous page. Your note talks about the “NHS [being] fucked in any scenario”. Is there any significance in the word “any”? Are you –

Dr Ben Warner: I believe that’s probably – and I would suggest that the document that SAGE is discussing is the way to investigate this, but what I would suggest is that it is likely that, as we’ve seen multiple times, the graph is drawn with an unmitigated peak, a mitigated peak, and maybe multiple mitigated peaks depending on the interventions that were brought in at that time. All of those are likely over the top for the reasonable worst-case scenario.

Counsel Inquiry: So it’s the various sort of modelled or proposed peaks that are the “any” in that –

Dr Ben Warner: I mean, I am guessing, given the – what’s in my witness statement, what’s in my notes, but that does look to be the obvious conclusion.

Counsel Inquiry: Let’s look back just for completeness, Dr Warner, at paragraph 56 of your witness statement, because you explain what you think you mean about these notes there.

So it’s on page 17 of your witness statement, paragraph 56. Thank you.

You fairly say you have no independent memory of the conversation at the meeting.

Then four lines down you say:

“The bracketed statement about the NHS likely means that in any scenario …”

And I think what you’ve explained today, you mean, as it were, in any of the worst-case scenarios that were under discussion.

“… the NHS will be under extreme stress.”

Is that what you mean?

Dr Ben Warner: Obviously in my notes it says “any”. Today I’ve given my best guess as to what “any” likely means, and yes, that’s what I mean.

Counsel Inquiry: You had an exchange, it may even have been on the same day, it was on the same day, could we have a look – yes, it’s been brought up, thank you.

If we look at the bottom first, this is an exchange of emails with Patrick Vallance after the meeting that we’ve just discussed. You say:

“In the SAGE meeting today, I was a little concerned the NHS didn’t seem to know what they needed for their models, and didn’t seem to have started modelling.

“Did you have the same feeling?”

And if we go out and look at the response, Patrick Vallance responds almost immediately:

“Yes I have been pushing them on this for the last 10 days or so. I think Steve Powis [who is a senior member of the NHS in England] has now grasped it …”

It says that they have:

“… been doing a lot of modelling … but the problem is that they haven’t defined the input availabilities well enough …”

But he thinks it’s on track.

Looking at this exchange, and indeed at the meeting, Dr Warner, so we’re now over two weeks after Exercise Nimbus, and the modelling is still in its early stages, variables haven’t been agreed, it might be thought that not enough was being done to grapple this rather obvious problem of the risk of the NHS being overwhelmed.

I’m not criticising you, but help us, you were there at the time. Clearly from your email you’re suggesting that they need to get on with it. Did you in fact think: why haven’t they done this already?

Dr Ben Warner: I – my memory of these meetings is not complete enough. I think that that email clearly shows that I’m concerned about the NHS’s modelling and whether we have a full picture of what will occur in the NHS at that time.

Counsel Inquiry: Let’s move forward a week or so, Dr Warner. Let’s look at paragraph 87 of your witness statement on page 25.

You’ve transcribed the notes that you made at that meeting, so we don’t need to go to them, but here this is – I think it was a Sunday, 8 March, the Sunday before the rather eventful week that followed.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: So you’re attending a meeting on a Sunday, which perhaps demonstrates how urgent matters were. Picking up again on this point about the NHS overwhelm, you say on that occasion:

“Still case NHS supply always … overwhelmed.”

Then in the paragraph below, you say:

“I was making the point that in any documents that decision-makers were considering, it had to be clear that in a variety of scenarios being considered the NHS would always be overwhelmed.”

So has something changed, Dr Warner, by this stage? Is it still the question of, well, it’s a worst-case scenario, it’s one of a few worst-case scenarios? Or is the position now, in your mind at least, this is something that’s actually going to happen?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm, it’s … it’s difficult to say precisely because we’re moving through a time when there is developing scientific evidence and people’s opinions are increasing in confidence about what the likely, let’s say their central forecast is for each of these different groups.

Obviously at this point I’m becoming increasingly concerned, and so I think what I’m trying to say here is that in the documents that are going to decision-makers there is usually some sort of reference to it, but that unless you sort of draw attention to it, that this will clearly happen, it is, you know, that – and it is – and that’s what I’m trying to say here, is that in the variety of scenarios being considered, I believe this is still reasonable worst-case scenario, it is very clear to the decision-makers that in these scenarios the NHS will be overwhelmed.

Counsel Inquiry: By this time, certainly according to Professor Medley, it was a common understanding, he says his understanding, and he said that it was shared with a number of other people on his committee, that the NHS would not as a matter of worst case but a matter of likelihood be overwhelmed. Had you picked that up by this stage, or were you …?

Dr Ben Warner: I think at this point, I’m – you know, we – I obviously had developing concerns. I believe that our – across a range of issues. The issues about “is mitigation the right strategy” is one of them, for obvious reasons, though the actual uncertainty around the IFR, even at this point – sorry, the infection fatality rate – even at this point I don’t think is – I think the estimates were probably between 0.25% and 1%, on around about this date.

Counsel Inquiry: Let me take you to another document, Doctor, and this involves going forward to the end of that week.

So it’s INQ000196052, please.

Now, this is a document you drafted. It’s not dated but you do refer to it in your statement as a document that you started drafting on that Friday the 13th.

Dr Ben Warner: Just to flag, this is a draft from part of that document. There is another – the same document, which is the fin – a later draft that’s also in there.

Counsel Inquiry: But is it right that this is your thinking on the Friday the 13th?

Dr Ben Warner: I would suggest the later document is probably better, but I’m also happy to use this document, yes.

Counsel Inquiry: All right. Well, we’ve got this one on screen and if you tell us there’s an important difference –

Dr Ben Warner: The summary is different because it contains the fact that herd immunity is going to collapse the NHS.

Counsel Inquiry: Well, let me ask you just about two paragraphs that are in front of us, and you can tell us whether they remained in the final version and explain if they changed.

Starting at the top, you refer to the fact that the government had chosen to follow a mitigate strategy:

“This means that we are aiming to build herd immunity by late autumn.”

And then you go on:

“The consequence of this is that we are not completely locking down our population to stop the epidemic, but are simply trying to reduce the effect of the pandemic to a level that the NHS can cope with.”

If we look down, we’ve actually got enough on screen, you refer a couple of paragraphs down to the alternative plan, the suppression model, and then two paragraphs below that, you come back to the theme which is that for this plan to work, that’s the mitigation plan, it’s crucial that the NHS does not collapse.

So at least on this draft of this document in that week, it’s clear that you understood that the idea of preventing the NHS from collapsing was an integral part of the mitigation strategy.

So I wanted to come back, with this in mind, to the question I asked you earlier: is that a view you had sort of developed or formed by 13 March? Or was it actually always your understanding that preventing the NHS collapsing, lowering the peak to a level below NHS capacity, was always part of the mitigation strategy?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe at this point we’ve published the action plan where I think it likely talks about this, but I can’t say with certainty. And also there was obviously, I believe, a press conference where it was discussed.

Counsel Inquiry: Well, I’m not going to get – the action plan doesn’t certainly refer to this in terms. But, you see, one possibility – we can all see that as a matter of political reality it’s simply not politically feasible to have a response to the pandemic which involves the NHS collapsing.

Do you think it’s possible that over time, and that by 13 March, that sort of political reality had had to be factored in to the mitigation scheme, even if perhaps it wasn’t understood several weeks earlier?

Dr Ben Warner: I think your political feasibility I can’t speak to, but it is worth thinking about – considering the fact that there might be viruses in the future that have a reproduction number that is high enough that you can’t suppress it in the way that we did, that actually a lockdown would fail. So that is, I think, something to recognise, that this isn’t just about politics, there’s actually, you know, real world events that change how you have to react to a virus.

As to this document, as to whether the NHS collapses or not, obviously at this point I see it as crucial. Obviously at this point I understand that if the NHS does collapse, that brings with it, you know, people die who did not need to die.

Counsel Inquiry: Just following on from that, first of all, bearing in mind what you say about this being a draft, and there’s a later version, was this a document you drafted for yourself or for other people to see?

Dr Ben Warner: This I believe is something that I began drafting with the idea of trying to persuade others that our current strategy was not the right one.

Counsel Inquiry: And did a further draft of this document go, for example, to the Prime Minister?

Dr Ben Warner: In my witness statement I talk about the document I drafted. I also discuss another document that was drafted on the Saturday, which I think is clearer and talks to the same views, that was – I think we had the intention of sending more widely.

However, on August 15th obviously Neil Ferguson sent through a paper which more rigorously says exactly the same points. Also Angela McLean sends a paper to SAGE that says similar points. So we didn’t actually need to rely on my not brilliant English and communication, or the other documents. We could rely on the scientific advisers’ documentation to provide the evidence as to why we needed to change strategy.

Counsel Inquiry: Just –

Lady Hallett: You said August 15th?

Dr Ben Warner: Sorry if – I have misspoken, I meant March 15th, thank you.

Mr O’Connor: Just a few final questions, Dr Warner, on this theme. We have got to 13 March, which we’ve heard from many other witnesses was a key moment.

Can we look, please, at paragraph 122 of your statement, which is on page 35.

This is your summary, Dr Warner, of where you think, in your mind, things had reached on 13 March.

First of all, you say:

“… the epidemic was further along (that is, there were more infections and numbers growing faster) than had been anticipated …”

That was a development that took place at the SAGE meeting on 13 March, a revised estimate from the modellers, wasn’t it?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, I believe that they felt that the doubling time was no long – was not six days but three days.

Counsel Inquiry: Then this:

“… the capacity of the NHS was not going to be close to sufficient …”

So here at least you’re no longer – correct me if I’m wrong – talking about a worst-case scenario, you’re talking about a likelihood, a probability of what was or wasn’t going to happen?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, I’m discussing the forecast of how the disease will – how the pandemic will proceed, not a planning assumption.

Counsel Inquiry: And are you able to help us with how much before that date this view of yours had hardened into a view about actuality rather than a worst-case scenario?

Dr Ben Warner: On 8 March we are – we can clearly see the increasing concerns around mitigation. Not only, you know, is the overall plan for mitigation a good one, like, the correct one, but actually the state of that plan as well.

We – throughout that week, I was of the opinion we should move faster, even in – within let’s call it an envelope of the mitigation strategy. That view hardened – we can see that I start writing that document basically saying we should change the strategy. Then you go to the SAGE meeting on 13 March, where discussions occurred which leads me to what I’ve written here, that lots of people including members of SAGE did not think that the mitigation strategy was necessarily the right one.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. And that’s the third point you make?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: We’ve heard from other witnesses about the meetings that then took place over the weekend, on the Saturday and Sunday, and may I ask you, for now at least, some fairly high-level questions about that?

Dr Ben Warner: Of course.

Counsel Inquiry: First of all, by the end of the weekend, at least, was it right that a decision had been reached to change from a mitigation to a suppression strategy?

Dr Ben Warner: My memory of the Sunday the 15th meetings is I don’t have a clear meeting – a memory. I remember from the 14th there was, it felt to me, a prevailing view that we did have to move forward with the suppression strategy. However, you know, obviously it needed to be discussed with Patrick and Chris. But – and then – but I can’t – I’m afraid I can’t tell you with the certainty that I would like to be able to.

Counsel Inquiry: Well, it may be that my next question then will get much the same answer, but we’ve heard slightly different evidence from people who were there about whether decisions in principle were taken at around that time about a lockdown or not. One thing is clear, no actual decision to impose a lockdown was taken then.

We know that was some time later. But at least one witness, Lee Cain, said that he understood that in principle a decision had been reached over that weekend that there would have to be what we know as a lockdown. Others have made the point that that probably wasn’t a word that was being used then, but we know what it means.

But other witnesses, including Mr Glassborow this morning, have said, no, there were certainly decisions over that weekend about the range of more intrusive NPIs that were announced early in the week that followed, but not really any even decision in principle about a lockdown over that weekend.

Can you help us with that?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that it … I think my impression was that it was clear that we were going to have to change the strategy, that we were going to have to move to a suppression strategy. From memory on the 15th that was also – and, like I say, my memory of the 15th is very unclear as to – but I do think that the – my memory was that that was also the impression.

As to the exact measures, and what we now term as a lockdown, what was actually implemented, no, I believe that that level of specificity wasn’t discussed. I mean, you can see that in some of the pictures that are taken of the whiteboard, that, you know, those options are actually the things that ended up developing, so that we were discussing things on the 13th and 14th that then, you know, became what – you know, lockdown.

But I understand that, you know, this is an important question. I’m afraid I can’t answer more than I’ve done.

Counsel Inquiry: No, you have been very helpful, Dr Warner.

Let me ask you, please, about a document around this time, although it was a WhatsApp message between Mr Cummings and Mr Johnson.

If we could go, please, to INQ000048313. Thank you, you’re ahead of me.

So there’s a message from Mr Cummings on the right-hand side to Boris Johnson where he says:

“… the main problem is not them [and he is referring to Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance] – they and SAGE are doing a great job on the science/models, the Warners have interrogated [one of which is you] – the problem is [Cabinet Office] and DHSC haven’t listened and absorbed what the models truly mean.”

Then this:

“And timing wise you have been told a bunch of stuff based on ‘time to peak’ but not ‘time to NHS collapse’ which is an extremely critical difference!!”

Now, we can see that – actually I should have said this is dated the 14th, so it’s the Saturday.

Do you agree with that sentiment, Dr Warner, that in the period before that Saturday, that weekend, there had been inadequate attention on the question of whether, and if so when, the NHS was going to collapse?

Dr Ben Warner: I agree with that entire message.

Counsel Inquiry: In fact we see that Mr Cummings sort of amplified – emphasised it in the message below, he says that’s “what the Warners have been screaming” at him. Was that metaphorically screaming, Dr Warner, or actually screaming?

Dr Ben Warner: Metaphorical.

Counsel Inquiry: Let me finally, then, just in a couple of minutes, ask you some more general questions, and then perhaps it will be a good moment to take a break.

I just want to ask you, as I say, some more general questions about the period up to that weekend.

First of all, can we look at paragraph 303 of your statement, please, on page 78.

As we have observed, one thing we can say about the period running up to this weekend is that throughout end of January but certainly February and the first part of March, the policy was one of mitigation, and really that was what everyone was thinking about.

At paragraph 303, the last two or three lines, you say:

“From early 2020, we should have developed alternative plans (for example lockdowns), after seeing the actions in China or at least after northern Italy.”

So is your point, your recollection, Dr Warner, that there was, if you like, too narrow thinking during that early period or too much weight was placed on one strategy? What are you trying to get at here?

Dr Ben Warner: I think what I’m trying to say here is that for some diseases we will want to use a mitigation strategy, for some diseases, like HIV, we use a suppression strategy. I think once we saw that other countries were implementing a suppression strategy, even if we felt that mitigation was currently the right choice for the UK, we should have started working up plans around suppression.

Counsel Inquiry: Why?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that the answer is that – well, actually, sorry, I can answer that more correctly. In a mitigation strategy, as we’ve seen, the problems that you have are really around horribly excess deaths, et cetera. However, in a suppression strategy, you need to bring in methods of control, so test and trace, testing. These things require time to start up, they require time to build. The capacity of the state – obviously once we’ve failed to contain, we know that those – the systems we have in place cannot – will not be able to do it for when the virus is higher. Therefore for suppression you do need to have plans of how you’re going to increase your testing, how you’re going to have increased test and trace, how you’re going to do many of the other things that we found we had to do in Covid to suppress the virus and stop it spreading throughout our society.

Counsel Inquiry: Thank you. So that’s the sort of practical reason why one needs to think about a suppression strategy early.

I wasn’t very clear, but what I had in mind in asking you about why you need to think earlier is that one of the criticisms that has been suggested of the SAGE system is that it depends on providing these consensus statements, whereby it is, as it were, a summary of everything that people don’t disagree on, and the suggestion has been made that one consequence of that system is that one doesn’t find in SAGE documents, certainly the statements, a variety of options, and so one doesn’t, for example, see, well, a group of people think this, a group of people think that, and yet another group thinks you should be thinking of something even different again.

Do you think that it was that requirement always to find consensus on something that perhaps led to the suppression strategy being left out of account in those early months?

Dr Ben Warner: I think – I do worry we’re reading too much into the idea of consensus statement there. As you see in my witness statement, I tried to suggest that we should bring in similar consensus statements around other things, like how people are behaving, what are done in lockdown. Because actually I think the idea of taking very complex sets of data, very uncertain data, and bringing it together so that a person can have an informed view over one or two pages is actually a hard task and it’s important, and I think that that idea of making sure that people have two, three pages of insight rather than data is actually important. If we were just feeding people the data that SPI-M were seeing, I mean, I’m not going to be able to understand that.

So I think that to say that – that the consensus statement is the error, because actually they are sort of showing people what is going to occur. I think that the interface into COBR, into DHSC, how that was interpreted, I cannot speak to. But I think this idea that SAGE is now – either actually that is speaking to the SPI-M statements on the SAGE minutes, how they flow into the system, what is the right way to transfer complex scientific opinion into departments so they fully understand, my personal opinion is the way you do that is high bandwidth conversations between experts. You’ll see throughout my witness statement I’m always worried about the lack of epidemiology in government. I sent an email to Simon Case saying the first thing I’d do – when he became perm sec, then the first thing –

Counsel Inquiry: Just slow down a little bit.

Dr Ben Warner: Apologies.

The first thing I would do would be to ask Angela McLean to join, because of the fact that actually high bandwidth communication between experts is how you confer that uncertainty, how you confer that disparate … so I think it’s almost – it’s, weirdly, in discussing how maybe the – by moving to SAGE statements the bandwidth compression leads to a not full information. I’m worried in that simple statement we’re doing the same thing.

Counsel Inquiry: I just want to take you back, though, to this paragraph. You are quite clear that – in the view that more should have been done to think about a suppression strategy earlier than in fact was the case. I asked you whether you thought that one explanation for that not happening was the consensus system, if I can put it that way, and I think you’ve said no, you don’t think that’s the problem. Are you able to identify what went wrong in the fact that the suppression strategy wasn’t considered as early as you think it should have been?

Dr Ben Warner: I think it – we can all look at, you don’t need, as we talked about earlier, complex models to look at the activities China was taking or the activities that were going on in northern Italy and think that we should have alternative plans. That’s the statement I’m making. As to where those plans should have been constructed, who should have made the decision to construct those statements, I’m afraid I’m not the right person to ask for that type of thing.

Counsel Inquiry: Okay.

One last question perhaps before we have a break, Dr Warner, then, and it goes back to the question on reflection of consideration of NHS capacity.

We saw in that WhatsApp that Dominic Cummings was saying that, if you like, Boris Johnson had been given the wrong aiming point or at least hadn’t been given a set – that important aiming point of time to NHS collapse. I’ve taken you through the chronology, admittedly fairly swiftly, of your understanding of the position vis-à-vis the NHS, including the starting point of Exercise Nimbus. Do you think that more consideration should have been given to the whole question of NHS capacity during that period, and if so, by whom?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that there is a clear difference between a reasonable worst-case scenario and a forecast. How that forecast was made, who is in charge of what is the right plan, I think is an important question and one of the reasons why I think the Inquiry is so important.

As to the consideration of the NHS … I think that the – that it is correct that many reasonable forecasts from at least, let’s say, March 8, where I talked about an IFR of 0.25, 0.5, 1, all of those numbers roughly come down to the idea of an NHS that is almost certainly overwhelmed, even if not overwhelmed under incredible stress, and I think at that point it’s clear to everyone that more thought and at least – at the very least, as Angela McLean talked to me, you know, she said to me, “Do you know that – do you think that senior decision-makers know what this strategy is saying?”

I remember that because she used the phrase, you know, the “only way out is through”, as in once you’re in a mitigation path, you have to stick to the path.

And I think that even from March 8 I do not think that that was given the consideration it deserved.

Counsel Inquiry: That leads to what I promise really will be my last question, Dr Warner, and it’s this: another of the themes of the evidence we’ve heard from those scientists who were sitting on SPI-M and SAGE is that I think really throughout – well, certainly for the early part of the pandemic, certainly in this period, they said that they didn’t really have a proper understanding of what the government’s policies and priorities were, which made it difficult for them to do their work, their modelling and so on.

Do you think it’s possible that they didn’t realise in this early period that the overwhelming of the NHS would be unacceptable to the government and that that is perhaps one reason why more wasn’t said about this on the SAGE side earlier?

Dr Ben Warner: I think we have to be careful drawing inferences on where mistakes occurred, because of the fact that I don’t think I have any evidence.

I do think that SAGE did understand. Whether that was translated into the government plans, and the government plans updated given what SAGE was saying, I think is an important question, and I’m - but I’m not sure I have that much to add to it beyond what I’ve put in my witness statement.

Counsel Inquiry: Just to be clear, then, are you saying – and we’re not asking you to say things that you don’t know or draw inferences that you’re not comfortable with, but you were there and we weren’t – are you saying that from the time you started attending SAGE, which was the middle of February, it was commonly understood that the NHS being overwhelmed would simply be a red line and couldn’t be allowed to happen?

Dr Ben Warner: No, I don’t think that – no. I think that … I don’t know if the government’s plan had specificity of that type at that point. So whether SAGE wasn’t aware of it or whether that specificity did not exist I cannot speak to.

Counsel Inquiry: All right.

Lady Hallett: I think you’ve had enough final questions, Mr O’Connor.

Mr O’Connor: I was not proposing to ask even a single one, except perhaps, as my final question, my Lady, may we have –

Lady Hallett: I’m sorry we have to break, but I think it’s for everybody’s benefit, but we will finish your evidence this afternoon, I promise, Dr Warner.

3.40, please.

(3.27 pm)

(A short break)

(3.40 pm)

Lady Hallett: Mr O’Connor.

Mr O’Connor: Dr Warner, I’m going to move on, on the chronology, to the summer and autumn of 2020, but the theme at least picks up on something we were discussing before the break, which is the evidence that we heard from some of the SAGE scientists, at least, that they found there to be a lack of government policy that they could sort of receive and understand and use as a baseline for their advice, modelling and so on.

It may be that what we see in your statement is a wish that there had been perhaps more of that sort of carefully thought through strategy, starting perhaps at this sort of time, this period around the middle of 2020.

If we could look at paragraph 304, please, on page 78, I’m going to pick up on the second sentence, you say:

“Throughout the Covid-19 response, not enough resources were devoted to alternative plans and measures that strategically reacted to potential developments in Covid-19. Government’s ‘just-in-time’ policy making exposed the lack of expertise within teams, as the speed meant that it was difficult to pull in the appropriate expertise from outside, and this speed also forced a reliance … on visualisations of data, rather than rigorous quantitative analysis.”

Then in the next paragraph, you say that the decisions on the second and third lockdowns you think were correct at the time they were made, as it were, but the sentence starting however, you say:

“… I do believe we could have done more to prepare for these scenarios.”

So is it the case, Dr Warner, that you felt at this time that more could have been done, as it were, by way of sort of strategic planning rather than just reacting to events?

Dr Ben Warner: Apologies, by “at this time”, you mean?

Counsel Inquiry: Well, I’m focusing on the period after – from the sort of middle of the first lockdown, where thought it being given to emerging from lockdown, through the rest of the year. But you tell me if you think that there was a different time when strategic planning should have been –

Dr Ben Warner: Sorry, you know, I just wanted to … the statements you’ve just read out, I agree with.

Counsel Inquiry: Can you expand on them?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm –

Counsel Inquiry: What is it that you’re sort of driving at that you think should have been done that wasn’t?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that increasing the capability and the capacity within government on analytics, science, software engineering would have allowed those teams to have greater resources, greater head speed to – space to apply themselves to key problems or possible future developments, and that would have allowed us to meet the challenges of winter with a more robust strategy, have plans in the locker, as it were, as to what happens, rather than having to react and trying to come up with, as I say, sort of policy just in time.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. You do pick up again on this idea of planning at another section of your statement that I’d like to take you through, and that’s paragraph 164.

You may recall, Dr Warner, this is the passage where you refer to the two sort of opposite ends of the spectrum, in a way, the “running hot” policy of allowing infections to reach sort of an almost unsustainable point, as opposed to “zero Covid”, trying to keep them extremely low, and you suggest – and this is towards the bottom of this paragraph – that you think it would have been better to have tried to identify – rather than running between those two extremes, tried to identify what were the best and most effective NPIs where, as you say, the best means maximum effect on suppressing the pandemic for the minimum cost.

Is that something you feel either wasn’t done at all or wasn’t done enough, again, in the sort of middle period of 2020?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that that was the ambition, from May onwards, I think whether that was accomplished, and to the degree it was accomplished, I think is what I’m referring to in the paragraph that you wrote before – you read out before.

Counsel Inquiry: Are you saying it wasn’t achieved as well as you think it should have been, or as much as you think it should have been?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Let’s just look, again you wrote a few documents around this time trying to capture this point, and I want to show you one of them, which is INQ000195939.

Again, it’s not dated, but I think it’s sort of around about April/May of 2020; is that right?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe I send it to Simon Case when he first became perm sec, and in that email I say I sort of wrote this five weeks ago, so I don’t know when Simon became perm sec –

Counsel Inquiry: I think that’s where I got my dating from.

But is it right in summary that what you’re exploring in this paper is this question of what’s the – I think it may have been referred to with another witness as smart NPIs or what’s the most effective NPI that we can – or combination of NPIs –

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: – that we can arrive at?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that is crucial, it’s the system of NPIs that in particular I’m focused on in this document.

Counsel Inquiry: We may see the best description of this if we look on the second page of this document, where you say:

“… in order to lift the measures …”

That’s the coming out of lockdown?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: “… we need to replace them with other measures that have a similar effect on the epidemic, but a lower cost to society more broadly (economic, societal/public service, health).”

And so on.

Just pausing there a moment, we’ll come on to see that you say more about those sorts of other impacts of a lockdown. We have, for example, so far today, you and I, spent a lot of time talking about the epidemiology, the infection rates, how many people are dying and so on. Here you are mentioning the other negative impacts of lockdown.

Were those things considered throughout the period we have been discussing, so from the start of 2020? Did they start to become considered more around this time, in April and May 2020?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that … from March 14 we essentially started to construct a plan of suppression. In the time period while we’re trying to build the – that – the plan out of lockdown – apologies, I can’t remember the name of that one that released sort of – I think it was sort of mid-May – we’re trying to push towards this idea of: okay, how can we control the virus but mitigate the harms that, you know, everyone was definite – was very aware of?

Counsel Inquiry: The economic and societal harms?

Dr Ben Warner: Yeah. I mean, public service and health, yeah. You know, these were – these harms were talked about.

Counsel Inquiry: If we see in this list of three points that we have on the screen here –

Dr Ben Warner: I think it might be four and I’ve just mistyped.

Counsel Inquiry: Well, we’re looking at the first three anyway. You –

Dr Ben Warner: Sorry, by that, I meant “economic, societal [comma] public service, health”.

Counsel Inquiry: I see. Well, I was going to move on to the three numbered points –

Dr Ben Warner: Oh, apologies.

Counsel Inquiry: Don’t worry.

You’re describing there, aren’t you, in these numbered points this way of sort of integrating and trying to achieve the most effective combination of NPIs?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: And in particular in point 3, you refer to the “small crucial vulnerable groups who are indirectly affected”, and trying to make sure that their interests are not missed in designing the best possible combination of NPIs; is that what you’re trying to say there?

Dr Ben Warner: Yeah, I think that in – you know, in – when we’re thinking about the system, we’re trying to make sure that we don’t accident – you know, harms are inflicted lots across society and not inflicting them on a group, maybe because two measures inflict that harm on a single group of people, and that means that that group of people is seeing the full harms compared with the rest of the system. That’s what I’m trying to say there.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. We can see that the examples you give are – well, the second is domestic abuse, about which we’ve heard with other witnesses. You talk about “household quarantine”; do you know what you meant?

Dr Ben Warner: I think what we’re saying there is people who are having to isolate in a situation where we would – in a situation where there is domestic abuse going on.

Counsel Inquiry: So this all seems very important, Mr Warner, and points like giving careful thought to the impact on these vulnerable groups and so on is obviously – perhaps obviously the right thing to do.

You are talking here quite strategically, sort of blue skies thinking. How much were these principles taken up in the actual decision-making in Downing Street in the weeks and months that followed?

Dr Ben Warner: Here I’m trying to suggest sort of a systematic approach to this problem, and about thinking about it as multi-disciplined teams. My opinion is that lots of people – there’s lots of expertise, you know, policy, science, analysis, and putting those people together in a team is very effective, and actually the sort of standard government silos is not necessarily the most effective way, in my opinion, of working. And so I’m trying to pitch a slightly different way of working into government and how it thinks about these problems.

Counsel Inquiry: We’re going to come on to talk about your proposal for a Covid-A, a sort of analysis team. Is that what you – the sort of thing you’ve got in mind here, or not quite the same?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that they are looking at different problems. Here what I’m trying to suggest is for this problem of: how do we improve the system of NPIs? That’s what this is looking at. The Covid-A is more about the fact that policy takes time to write, and the analysis for that policy takes longer. The analysis that that data is based on, so the collection of that data, takes even longer to build, especially if you have to collect it and there’s a time sequence to it.

So for Covid-A I’m talking about the leadership and the decision-making structures as to, you know, what is the appropriate data infrastructure to build, what should the analysis be done, that has to be done eight weeks in advance for a decision that might be needed for the policy.

So they are all around trying to push forward how government thinks about analytics, but one is around a specific problem, and the other one is around: how do we lead and organise as a sort of a group?

Counsel Inquiry: Before we leave this, though, Dr Warner, back to the main point, which is that things didn’t work out quite as neatly as this, NPIs weren’t finessed and thought through deeply, with a sort of a well thought through – out – thought through combination of measures being imposed. Perhaps you’ll say they were, but the scheme that you’re suggesting here, do you agree, wasn’t something that worked, at least in full, in practice?

Dr Ben Warner: It wasn’t implemented.

Counsel Inquiry: And was that because that events just made it impossible, or do you think that it could have been and should have been implemented?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm … I think every person has their own opinion on what is the best way to organise. In the end, the Covid Taskforce organised along more traditional sort of government lines of policy delivery, analysis. I don’t think we ever got to the bottom of – you know, it was a continued vexing question in February as to what is the most effective system of NPIs, so I think that the system that we had in place didn’t quite manage to do it.

However, whether this would have accomplished – which is what is a very hard task, I think, is … I can’t speak to whether this system would have worked.

Counsel Inquiry: No. No.

Let’s move on, please, Dr Warner, and I want to ask – we’re going on towards the autumn of 2020 now. We all know what actually happened, we know that there were calls from the scientific community for a circuit breaker lockdown. You were still attending SAGE at this time, I think, so you would have known all about that. We know that, at least initially, that is not what happened; rule of six, local tiers, and so on.

I want to ask you to look at some WhatsApp exchanges that you had over this period with Lee Cain, who has given evidence to the Inquiry, and I’m going to show you them and then ask you about them after that, if I may.

I’m on page 3. You see them on the screen, Dr Warner. Do you see them?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: They’re in three little time groups, so I’ll take you through them each and then ask you about them all together, if I may.

So starting about four, five lines down from the top, on 18 September – do you see that – you saying:

“I feel like you and I walked out of covid in June, walked back in today. And literally nothing has changed!”

Lee Cain says he agrees, and you say “Mad”.

So there’s an exchange in the middle of September.

Moving forward almost a month into October,

“We are so fucked.”

Lee Cain says:

“Why are we not acting in London and urban areas now? Same errors as March.”

You say:

“Agreed. Feel like we are where we knew we would be three/four weeks ago.”

Lee Cain says:

“Should have done a circuit breaker. And still should – half term might be too late. London will soon be out of control.”

Then if we can go down two or three more lines, another fortnight or so to 30 October, you say:

“I feel like we have accidentally invented a time machine.”

Lee Cain says:

“Oh mate.”

And then:

“I can’t take this insanity.”

Now, so over a period of a month, or a month and a half, three short exchanges, you’ll see they have similarities, you both seem to be saying and agreeing perhaps that not enough lessons have been learnt from experiences earlier in the year, perhaps that lockdowns October, Lee Cain says: should have been ordered earlier.

Can you tell us, if necessary looking at the three exchanges in turn, what you thought around this time and whether these exchanges reflect your thinking or not?

Dr Ben Warner: So, I mean, I feel these WhatsApps are indicative of what I was thinking but not necessarily the best evidence. I think that it’s clear in – can you scroll up to the top so I just get the dates right?

Counsel Inquiry: Yes, so 18 September.

Dr Ben Warner: Yeah. So in – actually earlier than that, if we’re honest, we had a rising problem with infections, infections were rising. Indeed, I believe if you – and so, you know – and when I say to Lee, “We walked out of

Covid in June, walked back in today, and literally …” what I’m saying is that the capabilities that we discussed earlier actually, track and trace, things like that, did not manage to stem the virus, our knowledge of what NPIs were most effective was not that much more advanced. So essentially the decision-making that was occurring – actually, the one thing I would say here is we do have the ONS infection study. That is an excellent piece of analytical work which actually allows us to be very clear, when we’re talking about infections rising. When we talk about “We knew where we were three/four weeks ago”, that’s predictions off the ONS infection study. This is basically, you know, we are seeing that infections will keep rising until you do something.

Counsel Inquiry: So expand on that a little, but do you – was it really therefore your view that things – the best use hadn’t been made of the time from, say, April/May through to the autumn?

Dr Ben Warner: I detailed, you know, sort of, in my witness statement some of the things about – on that period, and some of the things that I think we could’ve brought in better, some of the ways we could improve the analytics.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. What about this idea that there should have been a lockdown in September/October? I think perhaps in fact you and Mr Cain might not have had quite the same view on that matter?

Dr Ben Warner: I think I refer to this in my witness statement.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes.

Dr Ben Warner: So not – not having that in front of me, I think my answer would be that there are probably two arguments for, let’s say, increasing the stringency of measures for a short period. The first is that – the obvious effect that that might have on infections. The other is that maybe that increases public awareness, maybe moves people’s behaviour in – towards, you know, behaviour you want, maybe less – more people work from home, et cetera.

My opinion at that time was that infections would continue to rise unless we brought in more stringent measures, so I believe that I was of the opinion that actually it was about bringing in the measures that we thought we could hold for the whole of winter because they would be necessary, not necessarily bringing in stringent measures and then going back to as we were today. So I think that was my opinion at that time.

Counsel Inquiry: You do describe in your witness statement that when the time came for, in the end, Boris Johnson imposing the second lockdown at the very end of October, you actually thought that a more extensive and longer lockdown should have been ordered than was in fact ordered?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe what happened was at the end of the meeting that I refer to in my witness statement, I actually argued both sides of the lockdown, both a pro-lockdown argument and an anti-lockdown argument.

Counsel Inquiry: Go on.

Dr Ben Warner: I think that in November, if you have a four-week lockdown, I believe, rule of thumb, one week of lockdown – no, sorry, two weeks of lockdown moves you back, let’s say, one week. So moves you back four weeks. So let’s just say that if you lock down in November, you end up at the end of September. Well, in the end of September we were arguing for lockdown. Right? So essentially what you’re arguing for – is you’re back in an area where you were arguing for measures anyway. That would be the argument against the lockdown. Well, it basically say – sorry.

So, yeah, so –

Lady Hallett: I think you’ve lost me.

Dr Ben Warner: Yeah, I’m sorry, I’ve lost myself.

Mr O’Connor: Okay –

Dr Ben Warner: So, yeah, let me start again, I’ll try and be a bit more clear.

A four-week lockdown will reduce infections, let’s say, just rather than trying to do maths in my head under pressure, back to let’s say late September. In late September, SAGE were arguing that we need to bring in measures. Therefore actually that’s an argument that a four-week lockdown is not long enough to –

Counsel Inquiry: Inadequate?

Dr Ben Warner: Yeah, exactly.

Now, obviously lockdowns bring with them tremendous harms, therefore if you don’t think that – if you think the lockdown, as to use your words, was inadequate, is that an argument for actually maybe the lockdown – the harms of lockdowns are more.

So it isn’t to say that I thought that the lockdown was the wrong thing to do. As I say in my decision-making, in my document, I think it’s done. I think that these are complicated, hard decisions where there is, you know, uncertainty on how people behave, what will actually happen with how the – how much infections will drop, et cetera.

Counsel Inquiry: Just before I leave this, coming back to the point you made earlier, what we’ve been discussing is that decision made at the time, but for the reasons you’ve already given there are things which you say could have been done much earlier, earlier in the year, which might have prevented the need either for lockdowns at all or for lengthy lockdowns later in 2020?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm, sorry, I’ll have to read – but I think I’m trying to say that you might have to lock down but we’d alleviate some of the harms, which isn’t necessarily the time under lockdown. It’s clear that there are, you know, lots of people and lots of bits of – there are costs of lockdown across. as we discussed earlier, the health – people’s health, public services, the economic costs, the social costs, and actually we could’ve maybe brought in measures to mitigate those, even if the exact sort of length of lockdown and the measures stay the same.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes, I see. Thank you.

Let me move on to a slightly different issue, Dr Warner, and that is towards the – your analysis of data during the pandemic. To do this, let’s look at page 42 of your statement, paragraph 150, first of all. Is the first point you make – which is certainly something we’ve heard from other witnesses – was simply about the relative unavailability of data in the early phase of the pandemic? And you give an example of SPI-M struggling to access test and trace data.

First of all, can you expand on that problem briefly, and do we infer from your reference there to the early stage of the pandemic to the fact – suggestion that this was a problem which got better or resolved later on?

Dr Ben Warner: Data sharing is a problem, an acknowledged problem in government, how you do it. We shouldn’t overlook that there are reasons, that, you know, we need to protect people’s privacies, et cetera. In that period of time, I’m trying to – we’re also running – there’s another set of work around how we might be able to improve data sharing. In this cases, like SPI-M not – struggling to access the track and trace data is obviously a problem that creates uncertainty in the model that doesn’t need to be there. I’m sure there’s other teams in – across government that don’t have access to data that would have been useful to them.

Counsel Inquiry: So that’s an issue relating to simply the availability of data.

If we could look on at paragraph 152, though, you say that your main concern was not, by inference, this question of availability of data, but rather that the analysis work was too shallow. You say you felt that too often it – that is the analysis work – “contained a large number of quantitative judgements where no evidence was shown, and too often included graphs with unlabelled axes, or which were unreadable”, and so on.

Elsewhere in your statement you used this phrase “the importance of providing insight rather than or before data”.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Are these similar ideas that you’re referring to here?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Can you expand on what you saw as being your main concern in this regard then?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that, you know, analytical work is hard, it needs teams to have the right time, space, data, capability, also expert knowledge. I think that that’s – and often those teams didn’t have that, which meant that they were trying to do the best that they could, given the capabilities, capacities, time they were able to, rather than the piece of work that we would all think would be appropriate for that moment in time.

Counsel Inquiry: On a similar theme, Helen MacNamara, when she gave evidence, talked about an overemphasis on what she described as countable things – I know that you’ve looked at that statement of her witness statement – and the problem being that other issues, things like domestic abuse or even things like older people being isolated, because they didn’t sort of register in – on the figures, were overlooked.

Is that a similar issue, do you think, to your critique about insight rather than data?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: And help us: I mean, we’re looking forwards; if we have another situation like this, what would you recommend for change, how should things be done differently to try and provide more insight next time?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that it’s important to recognise the dashboard was a very important product that served a very important need, that allowed decision-makers to have up-to-date information on the crisis at that time. But, like any tool, it should not be used for every single purpose. For instance, I’m not sure what Helen means by not showing up in the data, whether she’s saying it’s a perceived risk, whether it’s there is evidence of this occurring but not in the data that is being shown in the dashboard, or that there isn’t any data on it. All those things could be true.

But I do think that for the future it’s important – and this is where we speak to sort of Covid-A – it’s about what is the right tool, the appropriate tool for the problem we’re trying to solve and making sure that, given that lens, do we have other lenses on the world to ensure that we think we’ve got a proper view of the situation, of the priorities, and to make sure that we understand as best as we can what the evidence is before we make a decision.

Counsel Inquiry: I think her suggestion was that certainly dashboards, as you say, were very useful, but perhaps they should include other areas of these sort of richer picture items as well as hospital capacity and so on?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that the way I would look at it is that modern dashboards, we can build automated system that very quickly flow the most recent data to Number 10. The speed at which analysis or policy or information flows to Number 10 is through traditional processes, people emailing private offices, emailing – private offices emailing, et cetera.

So what I would suggest is that what we need to do is build out similar toolkits that allow us to make sure that decision-makers have the appropriate information on risks like this, or alternatively make sure that decisions are taken at the right level where that information is known; and that is the other side of the same coin but looked at from a different way.

Counsel Inquiry: Sticking with data, Dr Warner, but moving on to a slightly different issue, you were obviously very immersed in all of these data issues during the pandemic. When did it become obvious to you, on a data perspective, that there were ethnic disparities or disparities in the experience of different ethnic groups appearing in the data?

Dr Ben Warner: I remember discussions in SAGE to this effect, but I can’t give you an exact date.

Counsel Inquiry: So that’s the SAGE probably February/March, realising, noting that the hospital data probably was showing up differential experiences.

Was this something that was taken forward without(?) the dashboard or trying to develop these sort of data analytical techniques at an early stage or not?

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t know what was in the dashboard. The dashboard had a large range of information.

Counsel Inquiry: Was it something, whether it’s on the dashboard or in other terms of data exploitation, that you had personal involvement in?

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t think I did, no.

Counsel Inquiry: Or experience of?

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t have any memories of that.

Counsel Inquiry: Do you, sitting here now, have any sort of reflections on whether enough was done to capture or analyse the disparities that emerged during the pandemic?

Dr Ben Warner: As discussed in my statement, I think that our data collection, our analysis, our ability to spend time to look for that, was weak across the board, and I think the reason that that is important we strengthen it for the very issues that you’re raising now.

Counsel Inquiry: Let me move on to another issue, and that’s economic advice and modelling. For these purposes, can we go to page 79 of your statement, please, paragraph 309. You say that:

“[You] felt that the biggest absence throughout the pandemic was the lack of economic modelling in decision making.”

You say that:

“HMT, who is responsible for economic modelling, has a strong set of policy officials, but when it came to [your] interactions for all aspects of [your] work in government, [you] found that HMT was severely limited when it came to specialists in science, advanced analytics, technology or data.”

Now, in June 2020, you chaired a seminar at Number 10 touching on these issues, I think it was called “The Economics of Lockdown”. I’m going to take you to an email about it in a moment, but, well, let’s look at the email and then I’ll ask you the question.

It’s INQ000235261, please.

This is in fact an email from Clare Lombardelli, who gave evidence this morning. She was at this seminar. You are not copied in on the email, I think it’s an internal HMT email.

We’ll look at the content of it in a moment, but can you give us some evidence from your own knowledge about how this seminar came about, who arranged it, what was its purpose, and so on?

Dr Ben Warner: I don’t … I don’t remember how it was set up, I think it’s very unlikely that I set it up, because I had very good relationships with the BEIS data science team who I knew were doing a lot of work in this area, therefore if I was to organise a seminar of this type, I’m almost certain I would have involved them.

Counsel Inquiry: Can you give us any clues as to who set it up? Can we assume it was set up at the Number 10 end of things rather than, for example, by the Treasury?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm … if it was – from the email it looks like it was not set up from the Treasury, and therefore the other two people in the room were Simon Case of Number 10 or Patrick Vallance, and of those two – well, your guess is as good as mine.

Counsel Inquiry: All right.

Well, let’s look at the email. Clare Lombardelli is, as it were, reporting back to her colleagues, isn’t she? She says she attended “an odd seminar with the above title”. Well, how much memory do you have of the seminar now, Dr Warner?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm … almost nothing.

Counsel Inquiry: All right.

She refers to it, “The castlist was the below”, and I think she’s referring to the – if we scroll out, it’s the addressee list for the email below. It seems to suggest that Chris Whitty may have been there, and Simon Case, and someone from the Bank of England, and also Patrick Vallance. Does that sound right to you? Or perhaps you can’t now remember.

Dr Ben Warner: My – I would trust the email list over my memory.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. But certainly it seems to be – we can see that it’s some people – a high level discussion; yes? The Cabinet Secretary –

Dr Ben Warner: I believe he was –

Counsel Inquiry: No, he was a permanent secretary in the Cabinet Office.

Dr Ben Warner: But, yes, agreed. You know, you’re looking at four, maybe five perm secs in that meeting.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. Then this:

“The discussion would felt very familiar – the economists all did a very clear pitch on smarter NPIs being able to deliver the same level of virus control at lower [economic] cost.”

She refers to a paper.

“There was a general conclusion (by economists) that the economics is not being considered enough. And a desire for a place to bring this together. They posed 3 options:

“1. An economics SAGE.

“2. A single model.

“3. Something more informal.”

Pausing there, as we’ve just seen, you also felt that that more economic modelling, more economic analysis ought to be being done, did you not?

Dr Ben Warner: Yeah, I mean, that’s probably why I was invited to this.

Counsel Inquiry: So carrying on reading, Clare Lombardelli states:

“The economists [obviously] killed the single model …”

We asked her this morning why it was so obvious that the economists killed the single model, and in summary she said: well, it’s just not achievable to have a single model which takes into account both epidemiology, health, economics, other –

Dr Ben Warner: I believe that there is one.

Counsel Inquiry: Well –

Dr Ben Warner: I believe that there is a – I think it’s called Open ABM that I believe Goldman Sachs helped build.

Counsel Inquiry: We’ve also heard, Dr Warner, from someone called Professor Keeling at Warwick that during the pandemic he started and did produce a model which addressed both epidemiological factors and at least some economic –

Dr Ben Warner: Yeah.

Counsel Inquiry: – factors. But does it seem obvious to you that the idea of a single model is hopeless?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that, you know, it’s important to recognise that forecasting the economy is incredibly difficult, forecasting an epidemic is incredibly difficult. Although it might seem hard, given the costs of lockdown I think it’s worth at least a good try, especially given that there did seem to be groups out there who were trying it.

Counsel Inquiry: Certainly the view of Professor Keeling, who had done this work during the pandemic, and also Professor Woolhouse, another epidemiologist who gave evidence – we saw his email at the beginning of your evidence – was that this is something that ought to be worked on before the next pandemic, more sophisticated models that could draw these factors together.

You’re not telling us that that’s a fool’s errand?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that it’s … it’s important that we don’t think that the next crisis will be exactly the same. In my opinion, upgrading the capability within government to be able to build out models of this type, to be able to engage intelligently with academics, bring people in and bring the most of our quantitative – the possibilities using quantitative modellings to bear on the problem is crucially important. But I would look at this not as we should be building a model; more we should be building the people and the structures and the capability to be able to do that for any future crisis.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. Well, that’s a useful caveat, but I think it’s actually not far from what Professor Keeling and Professor Woolhouse were saying because, as you say, there’s no point in building the precise model that you would have used last time now, but you want to be able to have that capability swiftly if another pandemic hits.

Lady Hallett: Dr Warner, can I ask a question? Sorry to interrupt.

Looking at, if we could scroll down to the passage which says:

“There were … some useful titbits.

“CBI have data …”

Just highlight that passage.

Am I being simplistic in this approach: you see the reference to:

“Hospitality: 20% to 30% operable at 2 [metres]; 60-70% at 1 [metre].”

Can you find that?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Lady Hallett: “Most in the sector need 70/80% to be viable.”

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Lady Hallett: Now, as a simple soul, I think: right, okay, so if 70% of hospitality – sorry, if hospitality needs 70% of capacity to be viable, and they can operate 60% to 70% at 1 metre, I would then want to know as a decision-maker: what would be the impact of having a 1-metre rule rather than a 2-metre rule?

Is that too simplistic?

Dr Ben Warner: I often find with analytics actually the most simple reading is actually the most sensible reading.

Lady Hallett: Would that kind of data or analysis have been with the decision-makers back at this time?

Dr Ben Warner: I mean … no, I think that – so I think I agree with you, that is the reading. I don’t know if that – even that very simple information would have been with decision-makers. But I also think it’s important that 60 – that says they have capacity to be viable. Well, actually the other option is: how can we increase their capacity? For instance, you know, outdoor spaces. How would that have made a difference?

So I think that is the level of analysis that we need to push to, to not just taking – given the current state, but what can we do to get to a better answer to mitigate the harms. And I think – so I would agree with you, and I don’t know if this was made available to decision-makers.

Lady Hallett: Sorry to interrupt.

Mr O’Connor: Not at all, my Lady.

Coming back to just, in fact, the paragraph above the one we were just look at, Dr Warner, we talked about the economists obviously killing the single model; reading on, it says:

“… some liked the idea of an economics SAGE. It was agreed that Ben Warner would follow up with [Ms Lombardelli], [Patrick] Vallance …”

And others.

Two questions. First of all, did you like the idea of an economics SAGE? And, secondly, did you follow up with those people about it?

Dr Ben Warner: So, I mean, I think that … yeah, I think – I am of the opinion that government doesn’t make enough of their expertise that exists across the UK, whether it’s in the academic sector or in the private sector. I think SAGE is a fantastic initiative, their science bit is the high water mark of government using the resources of the whole of the UK to bring to bear on a problem. So I think that obviously to me the economics similarly would be useful. The exact and precise method of doing that, to say whether it should be a SAGE-like structure or maybe having academic – economists with a specialism working with departments, I’m not an expert on economics, I wouldn’t be able to tell you the right docking mechanism, but obviously having the very thoughtful people working with government is a good idea.

Counsel Inquiry: One view – and this was a view expressed by Mr Glassborow when he gave evidence – says: we’ve got the Treasury, it’s stuffed full of economics experts, this is what the Treasury does, it provides economic advice and analysis to government, so why would you need an economic SAGE, you’d just be duplicating things. What’s your view about that?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that … leaving aside my view of what the capability of the Treasury is, obviously having the diversity of viewpoints is important, obviously bringing in outsider expertise is valuable. I think there is – to say that you know everything about such a complex problem, I’m not – I don’t think Stuart was saying this, by the way, but I think that obviously there is expertise to be had within our academics.

Counsel Inquiry: Did you follow this idea up at the time?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: And what happened?

Dr Ben Warner: So I believe the series of events is that Patrick Vallance suggested sectorial teams, and I believe Clare Lombardelli might have replied saying “Yes, that’s a good idea”. I made, I believe, an argument for using the – for a single model. I don’t know past that. I don’t think it would have been appropriate for me to set up this type of body. I think that … I’m not an economics …

Counsel Inquiry: Economist?

Dr Ben Warner: Economist, and I don’t have a, you know, an in-built knowledge of government departments, the best way to lock it in, et cetera. But I do think an economic SAGE would have been – or, no, I think us making more use of our academic sector across the piece, I mean, I don’t think we should specialise just economics, there’s other people – for instance, I had a very interesting talk at one point with a health economist who I tried to dock into testing, because I think the more people we get in, and also the more resources, right? I think that throughout the time in Covid we saw that the capability and the capacity of the academic teams was – they were struggling at times, and giving them that extra resource to give – would definitely be helpful. You know, our academic sector is packed full of really talented people and we should always be trying to use them in government.

Counsel Inquiry: Can I show you a related document, Dr Warner, and it’s at INQ000226497. This is a recently published – well, recently; it’s April of this year – report by the Institute for Government. We can see it’s entitled “The Treasury during Covid”.

I’m going to take you to one or two passages in this, but perhaps before we do, it’s important to understand: did you have some input into the research for this paper?

Dr Ben Warner: Yeah, I believe that the team that wrote this paper talked to me before writing this document.

Counsel Inquiry: All right. Well, I’m going to ask you about one or two passages in here, and when I do so you can tell us whether the subject matter is something that you spoke to the team about. We don’t want to have a sort of echo effect.

It may just be that we can look at one passage. If we can go to page 6, please, this is the executive summary chapter. At the bottom of the page, please, final paragraph, we see the report says:

“… when it came to more in-depth economic analysis – for example, predicting the potential economic impacts of different policy options or projecting how economic behaviour might respond to a renewed spread of the disease – the Treasury shared information much less effectively with the rest of government, particularly in 2020.”

Then this:

“Senior Treasury officials also vetoed proposals from other departments to establish a cross-departmental group to discuss economic impacts and the proposal for a socio-economic version of … (SAGE), which could have fed external expertise into government in a more systematic way.”

First of all, was this an area of their research that you spoke to the researchers about?

Dr Ben Warner: I’m afraid I can’t say with any certainty.

Counsel Inquiry: All right.

Well, leaving that to one side, then, can you help us understand this suggestion that plans for economic SAGE, which we just saw being discussed at the seminar and in that email, may have been vetoed by senior Treasury officials?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that Treasury would have been the appropriate place for an economic SAGE, in the same way GO-Science is the appropriate secretariat for the scientific SAGE. It did not occur. That’s all I can –

Counsel Inquiry: Well –

Dr Ben Warner: “Vetoed” could mean an active veto or a passive veto, and I don’t know which one the Institute for Government is referring to here.

Counsel Inquiry: Well, let me just ask you about your own experience, Dr Warner. You were the person looking at that email who was tasked with trying to take this forward. You’ve told us you tried –

Dr Ben Warner: Sorry, I didn’t want to give the impression that I tried to set up an economic SAGE. I – there was follow-up to that. I don’t think I would have been the appropriate person to set up an economic SAGE. I don’t even know who are the – what are the best economic departments in the UK.

Counsel Inquiry: I see.

All right, well, let’s just look at one more angle on this – it may be that it helps, maybe it doesn’t – but it’s a WhatsApp exchange you had with Tom Shinner, who worked at the Cabinet Office, did he not?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe Tom Shinner was brought into Number 10 to help with the tracking of projects.

Counsel Inquiry: Right. So at Number 10 rather than the Cabinet Office.

If we can look at INQ000269187, please, page 17. So we note that this is – it’s towards the bottom of the page. Yes. So I’m showing you where it starts “Depressingly”. So let’s just note the date, we have gone forward a bit, it’s February 2021. So I think it’s Tom Shinner who says:

“Depressingly I think there’s quite a lot of truth in this about Treasury approach.”

You say:

“I am waging my own small war against HMT, their culture is fucked.

“My new favourite line whenever they mention VFM …”

Value for money?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe so, yes.

Counsel Inquiry: “… is ‘well it’s only X percent of eat out to help out and probably won’t have such a terrible effect’.”

What were your views about the HMT’s culture in February 2021?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that HMT, in some ways they have a very strong culture that enables and empowers their officials, and that culture is very effective for some things they do. I think that that culture becomes – has a positive effect, but I think it has a negative effect when it comes to places where special technical knowledge, like I mentioned around advanced analytics, data, technology, and I think in that areas it creates a negative effect.

Also at this point I think that we are discussing with head Treasury around the use of the toy model, and I feel like they – as my witness statement documents, that I was concerned that the Treasury were not necessarily providing a neutral set of information for the Chancellor to make decisions upon.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. Well, that is something that’s in your witness statement, but I’m not going to go into it with you in detail now.

Just sticking with this idea of the culture, you’ve referred to matters that, as it were, internal to the Treasury, their resources, their analytical capability, what they were doing or not doing properly with the toy model. Is it possible that your rather jaundiced impression of their culture also relates to their co-working and the way in which they were or weren’t working with other government departments and Number 10?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that an open, transparent culture is always crucially important. I think that I had that working with numerous other organisations and groups. I think it is also important to mention, though, that for some of my interactions with Treasury, this message is true. However, in other areas they were unbelievably helpful, they were thoughtful, and really helped. For instance, they actually seconded a couple of officials into 10DS to help us around the spending review.

So I think it’s important that, you know, when we reflect on these WhatsApps, that we’re seeing a specific view at a specific point of time about, you know, one issue and it doesn’t necessarily reflect my entire views of what is a complex organisation.

Counsel Inquiry: Thank you, Dr Warner, we can take that down.

Just one further quick issue, and then I want to ask you about Covid-A. The quick issue is about an entry in your diary referring to Long Covid. So can we – sorry, I said diary; it’s a notebook, another one of your notebooks.

Can we go, please, to INQ000264429, and it’s – you have gone straight to that page, which is fine, Dr Warner, because you have looked at this book and the other pages of it, haven’t you?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: So we see there about five or six lines down a line which says “Infections up – long covid”.

I want to ask you a few questions about that in a moment, but before that, are you able to help us roughly estimate the date on which you wrote that entry?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe from discussions earlier we decided it’s about March 2021.

Counsel Inquiry: Right.

We can see just below that it certainly seems to have been before June of whichever year you were in, because you are wondering what’s going to happen on June 21st. So the main question was: was it 2020 or 2021?

Dr Ben Warner: You can see just above that it says, it may be spelt incorrectly, “efficiency of AZ”, which I think is referring to the AstraZeneca vaccine.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes, and there are other references in the book which make you think that we’re certainly in the first few months of 2021 rather than 2020.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: So with that in mind, here we have a reference to Long Covid then, in the spring or thereabouts of 2021. Can you help us with any more context or information about why you wrote that, what was in your mind, what considerations perhaps were being discussed at the time?

Dr Ben Warner: I’m afraid that my recollection of this meeting … I don’t know what meeting this is, I’m afraid. But it’s clear at this time we did know about Long Covid and if infections increase then, even if we don’t see deaths, then Long Covid is obviously another thing to bear in mind.

Counsel Inquiry: All right. Well, I’ll leave that there.

Finally, can we please go back to your witness statement and to paragraph 288 on page 75. You refer here, Dr Warner, to a retrospective meeting which happened in February 2021.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: We will remind ourselves that I think it was May 2021 that you left.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Did you already – was that, as it were, a planned date? Did you know in February of that year that you were coming to the end of your time, or not?

Dr Ben Warner: I believe so at this point.

Counsel Inquiry: Because what we will see is that there was a meeting, which I think you instigated, involving senior decision-makers looking back over the last year or so and trying to understand what had gone well and what hadn’t gone well.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: I wonder whether that was partly because you knew you were coming to the end of your time, or maybe that’s not the case?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that I was always trying to improve how we could do – improve analytics, improve data. I think that it’s important to realise that these are – you know, there’s a lot of people doing different things, some of which are – fall within the government, some don’t, ONS, and how we could enable and empower the teams was – is always important. I actually did a similar lessons learned exercise in September to try and make sure we’re understanding, making sure we’re listening to those teams, so that we – when we’re talking from the centre, we’re actually talking about the problems they have, not the problems that we believe they have.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes. This was, as we’ve said, a little bit further on in February.

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: Hosted, as we see here, by Simon Case.

If you look at paragraph 290, we see the list of attendees: Patrick Vallance, Chris Whitty, Clare Gardiner, Susan Hopkins, Clare Lombardelli from the Treasury, Ian Diamond. So a group of senior individuals from different government departments –

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, I would say the senior technical – the senior analytic leadership of our Covid response.

Counsel Inquiry: Let’s look, if we may, just at the – there are a number of documents that we have relating to this meeting, but I want to take you to the chair’s brief for it, which is – thankfully we have it on screen. Again, a number of issues that were discussed.

I’m going to ask you – if we can turn to page 2 – just a few questions about one of the themes, which was around governance and decision-making structures.

Before I do that, can you just give us an idea of, in more general terms, what the purpose of the meeting was, what the sort of scope of the issues that were to be discussed was?

Dr Ben Warner: If we just flick back one page –

Counsel Inquiry: Yes.

Dr Ben Warner: – we see that the idea of a retrospective, which is a well known thing that is done often within software development teams, where it’s basically just trying to uncover the mistakes that were made, and rather – and as the sort of retrospective, sort of, I’m going to call it a creed, says:

“… [whatever] we discover, we understand and truly believe that everyone did the best job they could, given what they knew at the time, their skills and abilities, the resources available, and the situation to hand …”

So what we’re trying to do here is to say to teams: actually, like, it doesn’t help us by playing some sort of blame game. Actually we know that improving analytics is important, we know this is a complex thing, we need to make sure that everyone’s – and so it’s trying to promote that open, truthful, transparent culture that actually allows us to discuss the issues and move forward with solutions rather than play some sort of blame game et cetera, which I’m not – I don’t want to say in any way the fact that the senior leaders – but it was just an idea that is done in software development that we thought might be valuable here.

Counsel Inquiry: Yes.

So if we can go over the page, then, the first of the themes that was to be addressed was governance and decision-making structures. And, to be clear, this is a document which was drafted before the meeting, wasn’t it, with – which detailed the advance thoughts that the people who were to attend the meeting had submitted?

Dr Ben Warner: So I believe that I talked to a large number of different people across the entire analytical landscape, including more junior members, because I think that’s also important, that we’re not sort of just talking to senior leaders, they – these people lead large organisations. So that’s where my comments come from, and then the senior leaders themselves I think put forward a document as to what they believed, and I think that Simon Case’s private office had some very good officials who constructed this document together to provide him with the best possible speaking note so that he could lead the meeting.

Counsel Inquiry: So that’s the genesis of it, and we can see that the obstacle then is identified as there being no forum to set the long-term analytic plan to prioritise resources, to drive operational action or evaluate programmes. The comment, which I think is your input –

Dr Ben Warner: Yes.

Counsel Inquiry: – says you feel this is where a lot of the other problems stem from.

“That this meeting is necessary and needs to be hosted by the [Cabinet Secretary] is itself evidence of the lack of this forum.”

Then we see comments by others, including from Patrick Vallance, commenting that there has been at times a lack of clear reporting lines for SAGE in the absence of COBR. And also Rob Harrison, for example – who was a director general of the Cabinet Office, I think – saying, referring to general lack of proactive longer term thinking.

So were these the problems to which you thought that Covid-A was the answer?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes. I think that, as it says there about the prioritisation of resources, the data infrastructure that needs to be built, where is the best place to put our software engineering talent at that point in time. Those decisions, there was no forum for that; for also discussing other problems that these teams were happening, there was no forum. So that’s – my idea of a Covid-A is – it’s just sort of like, well, there’s a Covid Operational, there is a Covid Strategy, so Covid Analysis.

Counsel Inquiry: Did you – I think it did – it was created, a Covid-A, was it not?

Dr Ben Warner: Erm, I don’t know what the energetic force of this meeting and what it actually ended up doing, to a degree.

Counsel Inquiry: Let’s not worry too much, then, about – in any event, about what happened last time. But looking forward, can you see that this is a sort of gap which might need filling in future situations?

Dr Ben Warner: Yes, I think that … I think it’s important to realise that the – to build data infrastructure takes a large amount of time, investment, to do analysis takes time, therefore you need some body that’s saying: okay, given the amount of resources we have, we need to focus on this problem, or to be able to move in the right set of talent for the period in time. For instance, if you need – at a certain point you might need data engineers to on-board the data, then you might need to bring more data scientists in, and you might be able to re-move those data engineers to another problem. So that ability to flexibly bring in your talent to focus on the priorities at the moment, given that with a long-term vision in mind, I think that that senior analytical leadership and how that is done for these type of cross-government problems – obviously departments are doing this within their own sort of digital and data teams, for instance, but how do we do that for the cross-government problems, I think is what I’m talking about here.

Mr O’Connor: Yes.

Dr Warner, thank you very much. Those are all the questions I have for you. There will be just a few more questions for you.

Lady Hallett: Ms Mitchell.

Questions From Ms Mitchell KC

Ms Mitchell: I appear as instructed by Aamer Anwar & Company on behalf of the Scottish Covid Bereaved.

Dr Warner, I’d like to ask you some questions about data, in particular availability of data.

The Inquiry has already heard a little – and probably will hear a lot more in later parts of this module – that there were problems obtaining data from devolved administrations, and that efforts were being made to resolve these, in particular, that devolved administrations thought they were unable to share data on Covid because of GDPR, and we understand that efforts were being made to obtain legal advice to explain to them that that wasn’t the case.

Were you aware of these difficulties in obtaining data from devolved administrations, particularly in relation to the Scottish Government?

Dr Ben Warner: Across government data sharing is an issue, and then also how the statistics is done across the devolved administrations. I’m not – I don’t believe I’m aware of those specific areas, but in general those are problems that occur for not just Covid but many other government problems.

Ms Mitchell KC: And we heard about that in your evidence so far.

I suppose it stands to reason if there are problems getting data it impacts upon the problems of analysis, but can you identify for us were there any specific impacts upon areas of devolved administration that impacted upon your work?

Dr Ben Warner: I think that, as discussed previously, whenever you have a lack of data, it means that you can’t focus on those problems. So the problems that you’ve mentioned about – that existed around devolved administration I’m sure hindered the ability to analyse that data and then produce the information – the necessary information to decision-makers.

Ms Mitchell KC: And was that something that you found? Were you hindered in that regard?

Dr Ben Warner: In my role, that type of level of specificity around a data source would not be what I would look at. We tried to set up a – well, we set up a data sharing team within the central GDS, which I think moved to the CDDO office, to try and give teams that are struggling with those issues a set of experts that could them advice, including legal advice, to try and address these exact problems.

Ms Mitchell KC: Following up from that, can I ask whether or not you’re aware of the person who was involved in liaising with the Scottish Government in that regard, so perhaps we can follow up and ask that question?

Dr Ben Warner: I’m afraid I don’t.

Ms Mitchell KC: Would you able to find that out for us?

Dr Ben Warner: I’m afraid that the question you’re asking is very important. It depends on the exact nature of the data, where that data – which department it sits in. So that would – that would be the place to ask, is the department that was interacting on the issues that you are worried about. And it could be actually multiple departments, which speaks to why data availability in government is sometimes very hard for these cross-government issues.

Ms Mitchell: Thank you.

Thank you, my Lady, those are the questions that I would like to ask.

Lady Hallett: Thank you very much indeed, Ms Mitchell.

That completes the questioning, Dr Warner, thank you very much. I’m sorry it’s been a long afternoon for you answering such questions, and with such care. Obviously you’ve been very careful with your answers.

(The witness withdrew)

Lady Hallett: Thank you for all your help, and we shall resume tomorrow at 10 am. Thank you.

(4.50 pm)

(The hearing adjourned until 10 am on Tuesday, 7 November 2023)