Transcript of Module 2C Public Hearing on 15 May 2024
(10.00 am)
Ms Dobbin: My Lady, may I call the first witness for today,
please, Baroness Arlene Foster.
Lady Hallett: Thank you for coming back to help us,
Lady Foster.
1. Baroness Arlene Foster
BARONESS ARLENE FOSTER (sworn).
Questions From Lead Counsel to the Inquiry for Module 2C
Lady Hallett: Thank you, Ms Dobbin.
Ms Dobbin: Can I ask you to give your full name to
the Inquiry, please.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, Arlene Isobel Foster.
Lead 2C: You ought to have a witness statement in front of you,
Baroness Foster, which you signed – just checking,
forgive me, it’s on 28 February 2024; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: Is that witness statement true to the best of your
knowledge and belief?
Baroness Arlene Foster: It is.
Lead 2C: I want to start, please, by asking you about your
background, if I may. I think it’s right that you were
the member for the Legislative Assembly for Fermanagh
and South Tyrone from 2003 until your resignation in
October 2021; is that correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: I think that you were also the leader of the Democratic Unionist party between 2015 and 2021, is that also correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That is correct, my Lady.
Lead 2C: During the course of that time, you held a number of ministerial positions, so you were the Minister for Finance and Personnel; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, for a short period of time, yes.
Lead 2C: Between 2015 and 2016; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: You were the Minister of Enterprise, Trade and Investment from 2008 until 2011; is that correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That is correct, yes.
Lead 2C: Then again from 2011 to 2015; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: You were also the Minister for the Environment as well for a period between 2007 and 2008?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: You had periods of being the acting First Minister, I think, between 2010 and 2015, when Mr Robinson had to stand aside for temporary periods; is that also correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That is correct.
Lead 2C: You were the First Minister of Northern Ireland between January 2016 and January 2017; is that also correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That is correct, yes.
Lead 2C: Then between 11 January 2020 and 14 June 2021, you were
once again the First Minister of Northern Ireland; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That is correct.
Lead 2C: So you were First Minister for a considerable period of
the time that this Inquiry is interested in; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that is correct.
Lead 2C: And you were also one of the ministers who had the most
substantial experience behind them in terms of
ministerial experience as well; that’s also correct,
isn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I want to start by asking you the same questions that
were asked of Ms Michelle O’Neill yesterday to see if
you accept a number of the points that she accepted.
First of all, that you and she were the joint heads
of government in Northern Ireland as of January 2020;
correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, it is a joint office, yes.
Lead 2C: And that you were jointly responsible for leading the
Executive’s response to the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, in a mandatory coalition, but yes, absolutely.
Lead 2C: Do you agree that the Executive Committee exercised
a joint responsibility towards the people of
Northern Ireland for the response to the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I do.
Lead 2C: Do you agree that this went to the single most important duty that you owed to the people of Northern Ireland: to protect their lives?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I want, again, to ask you precisely the same question I asked of her: whether you consider that you and your ministerial colleagues gave the people of Northern Ireland the leadership that they deserved during that period?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I have to say, my Lady, it was probably the most difficult period of my political career. I think it has been set out that I’ve had a quite long political career, but I can say without any hesitation that dealing with the Covid pandemic was the most challenging and the most difficult time, and I’ve had some difficult times.
But we certainly tried, as – all of the Executive, I think, tried to put their best foot forward and to deal with the issues that were presented to them. We had had three years without a government. We had come back on 11 January. We had a lot of things to do because there hadn’t been a government for three years. And we were then confronted with this global pandemic coming towards us. So it was hugely challenging.
And I think all I can say in regards my own leadership is that I certainly tried to do the best for the people of Northern Ireland, recognising that I was First Minister at the time.
Lead 2C: The question was a simple one, Baroness Foster, it’s whether or not you and your colleagues gave the people of Northern Ireland the leadership that they deserved during the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I think that’s a subjective question, my Lady. Other people will have particular views on whether they got the leadership they deserve. I can only answer it from my own perspective, and I certainly gave as much as I could during the time that I was in that position.
Lead 2C: So, Baroness Foster, is it your position that you did give the people of Northern Ireland the leadership they deserved?
Baroness Arlene Foster: My position is that people will have particular views on whether I gave the leadership that they deserved, and I’m sure that those views, my Lady, will be varying views. From my perspective I gave the leadership that I felt was needed at that time.
Lead 2C: Have you reflected on the leadership that you gave and the decisions that you were part of, and have you considered whether those were the right decisions for Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, of course, with the benefit of hindsight, you do think about all of the decisions that we took at that time, and no doubt we will go through some of those decisions today, but certainly at the time I took those decisions with the best of intentions, to protect the people of Northern Ireland, that was certainly the modus operandi that I was operating under at the time, that we had to do what was right for the people of Northern Ireland.
Lead 2C: I wonder if we could go to, please, to INQ000417025, and to page 9.
This was the message that the Chief Medical Officer sent after the meeting on 10 November 2020, where he said:
“Hang their heads in shame. Tell that story to the wife and two boys of a 49 year old who said goodbye to their father on Facebook on Friday. There will as a consequence be more.”
Perhaps if we could go to another message that was sent in respect of that meeting.
INQ000370538 at page 28, please. It’s the message at 18.19. Thank you.
“A huge thank you. I don’t know about you but I’m out on my feet for what when all said and done. Politics at its worst.”
Baroness Foster, when you see those sorts of views by a senior official, the Chief Medical Officer, set out in black and white in front of you, in relation to one of the most critical junctures of the pandemic, does that cause you a moment’s reflection about the leadership that you offered at that time?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, of course, my Lady, it does, absolutely, more than a moment’s reflection, it has to be said. But the Chief Medical Officer, like all of us, was exhausted by that stage, I think it’s fair to say. He worked so diligently for the Executive and for the people of Northern Ireland right throughout this pandemic. We had a very good relationship, and it saddens me greatly to see those text messages.
And actually it brings me back to what we were going through at that particular point in time, and it was an incredibly difficult point that we had reached. Because the context of those messages is very critically important, and I think to get the context we have to go back to September/October: people not actually abiding by the regulations, people tired, people fatigued by the regulations, people looking to the example, unfortunately, from some of the Sinn Féin ministers breaching the regulations in July; and so we’d reached a point where people were not listening as well as they had listened back in March/April time to the Executive ministers, and that’s a source of great regret.
Lead 2C: We’re going to go through those months, I think, in some detail in order to understand the advice that was being provided to you at this point in time. A number of people have given evidence about the meeting that took place over the course of those four days, and I think that I can put it generally that many regarded it as a nadir in politics in Northern Ireland. Do you accept any responsibility for that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I think we all have a responsibility to where we had got to on 9 November, 10, 11 November, because relationships were very poor at that time, I think you can see that from the minutes of that meeting. The deputy First Minister had given an interview on the Sunday saying that we can’t have continuous lockdown, we need to find a way to deal with that. We had discussed the issue outwith the Executive around close contact workers, hairdressers, beauticians, people who were pretty low paid, and at the time she had sympathy for trying to do something for those people, because some of those people, if they didn’t work they didn’t get paid. And it was that context that we went into the meeting, believing that we could give some hope and some relief to those people.
And then the story changed, once we started the meeting, and it became clear during the first day, I think, towards the end, that Sinn Féin, because the deputy First Minister was in the chair – and I think this is an important point, my Lady, to make – the way the Executive was chaired is that we took it in turns to chair the Executive, so if I had chaired the last meeting for the first five items, Michelle would chair the meeting the next time for the first five items, so it just so happened on that occasion that she was in the chair for the whole length of that very long meeting, which meant that she had control in terms of when the votes were to be put, or if indeed a vote was to be put, because we have a duty, as you know, under the Ministerial Code to try to find consensus in an Executive and try to bring everybody to the same point, and because she was in the chair she had the decision to make as to whether to continue to look for consensus or whether to put something to a vote.
Lead 2C: Is that a very long, long way of saying that you don’t bear any responsibility –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Not at all.
Lead 2C: – for what happened at that meeting?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Not at all, I absolutely accept my position as First Minister, I’m just trying to explain what the context was, why relationships were so bad at that time, and why we got ourselves into the position where the cross-community vote was triggered.
Lead 2C: It’s a feature of your witness statement, isn’t it, that you blame a number of people or other departments for what happened in Northern Ireland for the pandemic; do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I don’t agree.
Lead 2C: We’ll have a look at your witness statement.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: But throughout it you refer to the responsibility borne by the Department of Health, don’t you, for the initial response to the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, because – and I had an opportunity to look at the emergency response structure last night again, and it’s very clear from those documents that Health was the lead department, and that’s why both Michelle and I looked to the Health Department for information in relation to the coronavirus.
So that’s not a passing of the buck, it’s just the reality that we didn’t have the information in relation to what was happening.
Lead 2C: Well, I’m going to ask you about why you didn’t have the information, but are we to take it, per your witness statement, that it’s the Department of Health which is largely to blame for what happened in Northern Ireland during the first wave of the pandemic, or do you accept responsibility for that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I don’t think it was the Department of Health’s fault for what happened during the first wave of the pandemic. It was the virus that caused the damage to Northern Ireland and we were trying to deal with what was coming at it. Because nobody had any appreciation of the scale of what was coming towards us, and actually in mid-March at the meeting we had with the Republic of Ireland ministers, in those minutes you can see that the Chief Medical Officer, our Chief Medical Officer, is saying that he felt that the peak was around 14 weeks from then.
So wrongly, and I say absolutely wrongly, we felt that we had time, and we didn’t have time, and that’s a source of great regret.
Lead 2C: Saying that it wasn’t the fault of the Department of Health is not the same as accepting responsibility for what happened in Northern Ireland during the first wave. I’m going to ask you that question again, whether you accept that you bear any responsibility for the outcomes in Northern Ireland during the first wave of the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, of course I accept responsibility, I was First Minister at the time.
Lead 2C: And do you, for example, accept that you had joint responsibility with other ministers for the oversight, the general oversight, in terms of what happened, for example, in care homes in Northern Ireland during the first wave of the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, indeed, my Lady.
Lead 2C: Do you accept the concessions that were made by Ms O’Neill in her evidence yesterday that, by and large, there was no real oversight on the part of the Executive Committee until around mid-March in respect of the response to the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think that’s a fair comment.
Lead 2C: Right.
I’m going to go back and look at all of those things, but just turning then to your statement, so that hopefully we can proceed on an agreed basis. First, if we could go, please, to page 22.
Just picking up paragraph 72 at around the mid-point and the line that begins:
“However, with hindsight, we probably should have locked down earlier. Given that this was a novel threat and the information and modelling was developing all the time, a more precautionary approach might have avoided many deaths. In the event, Northern Ireland had lower case numbers than parts of England, and in particular London, when the national lockdown was announced, which meant that in comparative terms, Northern Ireland’s lockdown took place when we were at an earlier stage. This helped to minimise the loss of life in the first wave, albeit I appreciate this will provide no comfort to those who did lose loved ones at this time.”
Correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: That obviously doesn’t address the position in the second wave, does it? Do you accept, Baroness Foster, that you had more agency in relation to the second wave of the pandemic, and that you knew a very good deal more about Covid-19 during the second wave of the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think that’s right.
Lead 2C: Yet despite all of that, do you accept that more people died in Northern Ireland during the period for which you had a greater level of oversight, perhaps, than wave 1?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I do accept that more people died during that period.
Lead 2C: Again, do you accept that you, jointly with others, also bear some responsibility that that was the outcome in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I do.
Lead 2C: I’m going to go back and deal with what you said, then, please, at paragraph 36 of your witness statement. That’s at page 11, please. What you’ve set out there is that:
“… from the end of January to the end of February, pandemic planning was squarely within the remit of [the Department of Health]. We were receiving briefings in February from [the Department of Health] at Executive meetings and being advised in a general way of the various preparations that were being undertaken.”
Correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: When you say that pandemic planning was squarely within the remit of the Department of Health, what that means is that really it was no part of the work of the Executive Committee in January or February 2020 to be part of the pandemic planning in Northern Ireland; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I think in February, at the beginning of February, we started to receive updates from the Minister of Health under “Any other business” at the Executive meetings, and we were focused very much on trying to get a programme for government in place, along with a budget, and indeed we had an away day to deal with those issues on 12 February, and given that the Department of Health was attending COBR and dealing with the issues and reporting to us, that was the way things were running in February.
Lead 2C: I’m not sure that’s an answer. You said at paragraph 36 that until the end of February pandemic planning was squarely within the remit of the Department of Health. Did that mean that until the end of February, planning for the pandemic was not a matter for the Executive Committee?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, the response was being led by Health as the lead department. The emergency response was not stood up until March, as I think it’s been given in evidence. The CCG was – met on 20 February under the leadership of the head of the Civil Service, David Sterling, and so in terms of planning and response, the Department of Health was certainly taking the lead at that time, albeit that the head of the Civil Service held the CCG on 20 February.
Lead 2C: Yes, I’m going to come back and deal with what the CCG actually amounted to during that period. I’m just going to go back and look again at paragraph 36.
If we follow that paragraph down, I won’t read all of it out, but as you can see, Baroness Foster, what you go on to say, having addressed the position to the end of February, you say:
“This culminated in the Health Minister advising on 16 March … that [the Department of Health] had been preparing for the last 7 weeks. As this was a matter that was largely being dealt with by [the Department of Health], issues such as the implications of Covid-19 … were not raised to the Executive, save for the CMO’s comment on 2 March 2020 that the ‘virus [was] not like flu’ … There was also no consideration at Executive level of the appropriateness or otherwise of flu pandemic plans for managing the challenges a coronavirus might present.”
So really, is that an acceptance at paragraph 36 that really, until it got to 16 March, the Executive Committee really didn’t have any role in the response to the pandemic in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I don’t think it’s the case that we had no role in relation to coronavirus coming to Northern Ireland. I think that we had started to receive updates from the Department of Health at the beginning of February. As I say, the CCG was set up on 20 February, and planning was taking place, as I indicated in the Department of Health, but also in other ministries as well. You’ve heard evidence from the Minister of Education, for example, that he was taking planning forward.
So I think the setting up of the CCG was an indicator to the departments that they should be planning, albeit on pandemic flu readiness, and then we were told on 2 March that it wasn’t like flu, it was actually different.
Lead 2C: I think you had been told long before then that it wasn’t like flu, weren’t you?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Not to my recollection.
Lead 2C: Right. We’ll have a look at what you were told, and I will take you to that. But I wanted to start with the NICCMA protocol of 2016 –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – because I think that’s what you were referring to when you were trying to explain why the Department of Health was responding to the pandemic.
If we could go to that, please, at INQ000092739.
If we could go to paragraph 1, please, Baroness Foster, paragraph 1 sets out that:
“When an emergency … is anticipated which is likely to have a serious impact … to a part or the whole of Northern Ireland, central strategic co-ordination arrangements can be activated …”
Correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: And that part of the reason that they can be activated is to provide strategic co-ordination of the response to Northern Ireland departments; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: If we look at paragraph 3:
“The First Minister and deputy First Minister or TEO may activate NICCMA following a request to do so from the Executive …”
Correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: In the absence of any of the organisations or representatives set out there, they can be activated whenever TEO judges it appropriate to do so; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: So overarching responsibility for the standing up of these arrangements ultimately lies with the TEO or with you and the deputy First Minister; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that is correct.
Lead 2C: There would be absolutely nothing to stop either of you, would there, from calling for the activation of civil contingency arrangements if you thought that they were required?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, although I do note at paragraph 23 it says that it will normally be chaired by the head of the Civil Service and membership is comprised of senior officials, and we had an understanding that officials took the lead. Although I absolutely accept that it is the responsibility of both the First Minister and deputy First Minister in terms of ministerial roles.
Lead 2C: Yes, it would be absurd to suggest, wouldn’t it, that the heads of government in Northern Ireland didn’t have the ability to call for the activation of civil contingencies arrangements?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, it would be, yes.
Lead 2C: Much has been made, and in your witness statement, of the role of the Department of Health as the lead department.
Can we just go and look at that, please, at paragraph 41.
It sets out there:
“The Lead Government Department has a key role in NICCMA. It has expert knowledge of the cause of the emergency which it can apply to inform the response by formulating a prognosis, so allowing other emergency responders to understand the implications for their sectors and areas of responsibility. Under NICCMA it is possible that there may be multiple lead departments in a multifaceted emergency.”
Correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That is correct, yes.
Lead 2C: Can you help as to what decision you made or were aware of that determined that the Department of Health would be the lead government department?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, my Lady, we determined that because the minister had been attending COBR meetings alongside the Minister of Health for the Westminster government, the Scottish Government, and the Welsh Government. He was reporting back to the Executive on those occasions that he attended those meetings, and the coronavirus was a health emergency, which is why we felt that the Department of Health was the lead department.
Lead 2C: Did you actually make a decision to that effect?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I don’t think that it was minuted that we’d taken a decision, but that was the way it developed, because of the fact that the minister was attending those meetings.
Lead 2C: And you’ll agree, I’m sure, that paragraph 21(sic), and this description of a lead government department having a “key role”, in no way obviates or impacts upon the powers that you and the deputy First Minister had in the context of a civil contingencies emergency; do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I do agree, yep.
Lead 2C: So for all of the reference and all of the reliance placed in your witness statement on the fact that the Department of Health was the lead government department, do you accept that that’s no answer at all as regards the fact that the ultimate responsibility for the response to the pandemic lay with you and the deputy First Minister as the heads of government?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, as you know, my Lady, we have a different form of government here in Northern Ireland. The First Minister and deputy First Minister in Northern Ireland do not have the same powers as our counterparts in Scotland and Wales, in terms of directing ministers, particularly if those ministers are from a different party than those which we were in. Therefore, we have to use our soft power, as I call it, to try to work with all of the ministers. We can’t direct those ministers, but we have to try to find common ground where we can all move forward. And I really believe that I had tried to do that with the Department of Health, to try to have as much information as we needed to try to move forward. Of course, with hindsight, we didn’t have as much information as we should have had at that time, and I regret that deeply.
Lead 2C: I think we’ve already established that this protocol doesn’t in any way inhibit you or the deputy First Minister or the Executive Office from activating civil contingencies arrangements; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That is correct, but I do think, having re-read the document again, my Lady, that it’s a document that doesn’t reflect the realities of mandatory coalition, and I think it’s something that needs to be revisited to reflect those realities.
Lead 2C: We’ve already heard evidence from Mr Swann, and he confirmed, that in February 2020 he brought the issue of the response to the pandemic to the Executive Committee under paragraph 2.4 of the Ministerial Code. Correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: And it was brought before you, wasn’t it, because the response to the pandemic was, on any view, a significant matter; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, it was. Under our rules there are elements within departments that don’t need to come to the Executive, but if something is cross-cutting or significant or controversial, or indeed involves financial spending, then it should come to the Executive. But it came to the Executive under “any other business”, it did not come in the form of a submission to the Executive.
Lead 2C: Did you ever ask for a submission to come to the Executive from the Department of Health during February 2020?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, because there was no decision being asked of us from the Department of Health, and therefore the update that was given to us by the Minister of Health was something that was – seemed fine to us at the time.
Lead 2C: There was nothing to stop a submission being put forward, it didn’t need to make a recommendation, did it, in order to provide you with a full and proper update as to pandemic planning in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I don’t have the power to ask other departments to bring submissions, my Lady. Sometimes ministers will decide to bring submissions if they feel that they want to get the backing of members and to say that they’ve brought a paper explaining what is happening, what is going on. But the Department of Health, and I’m not criticising them for this at all, I’m just saying they came with a verbal update, it was not a written submission.
Lady Hallett: You say you don’t have the power to ask. Did you mean by that you don’t have the power to direct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Direct, yes, sorry. I do have the power to request and sometimes during the minutes you will see that I did request some things would happen, but I don’t have the power to demand that something comes forward.
Ms Dobbin: Baroness Foster, you’re surely not trying to suggest to this Inquiry that in February 2020 you were so impotent that you didn’t have the ability to seek proper and detailed information as to what the response to the pandemic in Northern Ireland was?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, that’s not what I’m suggesting at all. What I’m indicating is that we didn’t receive a paper, I did not have the direction power to ask for a paper, I’m simply saying we received a verbal update from the Minister of Health, and that’s how we proceeded during February.
Lead 2C: Yes, that’s because you didn’t ask for anything more, that that was the way information was provided to you; that is correct, isn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I could have asked, but he could have decided “I don’t have time and therefore I’m going to continue with my verbal briefings”, because, as I say, he wasn’t asking for any decision at that time. Once he started to ask for decisions to be made, submissions came to the Executive.
Lead 2C: You, collectively, were responsible in February 2020, weren’t you, for understanding Northern Ireland’s state of readiness and what was being done in Northern Ireland to plan for a pandemic; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: All that happened is that Mr Swann came to those meetings and provided you with an update; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: You didn’t seek any papers from within the Executive Office, for example, asking for detailed information about testing, did you?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, testing would have been a Department of Health issue, but you’re right, I didn’t ask for any papers from the Executive Office, because it was Health, as I think I’ve indicated, that was leading on our interaction with the UK Government, and indeed other devolved administrations.
Lead 2C: The fact that Health was leading, Baroness Foster, doesn’t in any way remove the responsibility that you had, overarchingly, with your Executive colleagues for the response to the pandemic; can we at least agree that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s absolutely the case, and NICCMA was set up on 16 March in terms of a response to the pandemic.
NICCMA’s not a planning body or structure, the planning takes place in the different departments, and I think you’ve heard evidence from officials to say that if officials had have been taken out of departments earlier to stand up NICCMA, then they wouldn’t have been doing the planning work in their departments, and the response part of our structures was not needed until March time, I think the first death was on 19 March.
Lead 2C: You’re conflating, if I may respectfully suggest, Baroness Foster, a number of different things in that answer. I wonder if I can tease them out.
First of all, without going back to the 2016 protocol, it clearly sets out in paragraph 1, to which I took you, that those arrangements can be set up in anticipation of a national emergency; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: It says we are to provide strategic co-ordination of the response and/or recovery.
Lead 2C: The first paragraph sets out that where an emergency is anticipated, those arrangements can be set up; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, but that’s also part of paragraph 1, to provide the strategic co-ordination of the response and/or recovery.
Lead 2C: You do understand that these sorts of arrangements are stood up in order to assist in the response to a national emergency? So in other words, if an emergency is oncoming, if you know it’s going to happen, these arrangements can be stood up in order to assist with the work done in order to meet the response?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes. And I think, my Lady, if we had numerous civil servants to go into NICCMA and not cause damage to the planning that was taking place in departments, then certainly we could have set up NICCMA earlier.
As it was, I felt that we could have set it up slightly earlier, to be in readiness. That’s of course with the benefit of hindsight. But I think the point that if you’re in a response mode, the planning has to happen in the departments for, then, the response to happen in the central piece, which is what NICCMA is.
Lead 2C: Yes, and there was nothing to stop you, for example, and the deputy First Minister, and indeed your ministerial colleagues, from ensuring that there was cross-departmental planning going on; you didn’t need to necessarily stand up the protocol for those purposes, did you?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, and I think the fact that CCG met on 20 February was an indicator to the departments that planning needed to certainly be taking place.
Lead 2C: Well, we’re going to look at what happened at the meeting on 20 February, and what that amounted to, in due course. I’m going to go, if I may, a bit earlier in time, and I was going to look at your witness statement, please, at paragraph 29 on page 9.
Again, just about six lines down, at paragraph 29, you say:
“I cannot recall precisely when I became aware that the virus was capable of asymptomatic transmission.”
And you refer to the handwritten notes of around that time, and I think you’re referring to the end of February 2020; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: If we could go, please, to INQ000391226.
This is a briefing that was provided to you on 30 January 2020, after a –
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, it’s to “PS/First Minister”, I didn’t see this. It went to “PS/First Minister”, which means the private secretary.
Lead 2C: So are you suggesting that you were wholly unaware of the update that was provided?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I didn’t have that.
Lead 2C: The deputy First Minister, the then deputy First Minister, Ms O’Neill, appears to have been aware of it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I certainly wasn’t furnished with that from my private office.
Lead 2C: Are you quite sure about that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I’ve certainly no recollection of it.
Lead 2C: I mean, one of the things that would seem perhaps extraordinary, Baroness Foster, is if this were not precisely the kind of document you were asking to see at around this time.
Baroness Arlene Foster: At the end of January?
Lead 2C: Yes.
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I’ve no recollection of this document.
Lead 2C: So Minister Swann was attending COBR; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That is correct, yes.
Lead 2C: And in fact two COBR meetings had taken place by this time; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: One might have thought that this is precisely the sort of information that would be provided to you, and that you would want at this time, in order to understand why COBR was being convened and what information was being provided.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Indeed, and as you know, we did get that verbal update, my Lady, on 2 February from the minister.
Lead 2C: Can we just go through this, please, and could we please go to page 3, paragraph 2. This briefing was setting out critical information about the risk level having been raised to moderate; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: It was setting out that the pandemic, or that Covid-19 could become a pandemic; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: If we go to page 3, paragraph 4, please, and look at the first two bullets, we can see that it was setting out that the modelling was spreading throughout China and globally; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: And that the “clinical effects … range from [the] asymptomatic”; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So information was being provided at this time?
Baroness Arlene Foster: To my private secretary, yes.
Lead 2C: What would be the point of providing it to your private secretary, Baroness Foster?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I am just simply saying that I have no recollection of this document coming to my desk. I’m not going to say it did come to my desk when I have no recollection of it.
Lead 2C: Are you saying that because the information in it is of a surprise to you, or is this information that you knew at the time?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, well, I think it probably forms the basis, my Lady, of what the Minister of Health brought to the Executive on 2 February, although I can’t confirm whether he talked about asymptomatic issues or not, because I’m unclear as to when I learnt about it – you know, the range was from asymptomatic to relatively mild through to pneumonic.
Lead 2C: Did you know that the virus was spreading globally by this stage?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I did.
Lead 2C: Did you know that it had been decided that devolved administrations – and perhaps we could look at this, please, it’s at page 4, paragraph 7 – that devolved administrations were to review their reasonable worst-case scenario pandemic plans for preparedness?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I do recall the Chief Medical Officer and Minister Swann talking about reasonable worst-case scenarios at the time in the Executive.
Lead 2C: Right, so you were aware of that; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: When we go, please, to page 7, paragraph 1, the additional information that the elderly and those with existing health conditions would be disproportionately affected?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Were you aware of that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I was.
Lead 2C: Right. So what information in this briefing was known to you or, sorry, was not known to you at the end of January?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I think the issue around asymptomatic transmission probably is the only issue that wasn’t brought to the – well, it may well have been brought, but I have no recollection of it – to the Executive.
Lead 2C: And again, can you explain why, if a paper was being prepared at this incredibly important time and sent to your office, you wouldn’t have read it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I wouldn’t have read it? Well –
Lead 2C: Why would –
Baroness Arlene Foster: – it would have had to come to me for me to read it, that’s the point I’m making.
Lead 2C: Sorry?
Baroness Arlene Foster: It had to come to me in order for me to read it.
Lead 2C: So do you think that perhaps someone in your office just decided not to provide it to you?
Baroness Arlene Foster: It may have been read by the special adviser or the junior minister, but certainly, my Lady, I’m just being completely truthful, I have no recollection of seeing this paper.
Lady Hallett: Which junior minister?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Oh, the junior minister under – Junior Minister Lyons or, indeed, the special adviser, because, as you’re aware, my Lady, my special adviser was a medical doctor, Philip Weir.
Ms Dobbin: So it appears that you probably knew everything that was in this paper, but with a question mark over asymptomatic transmission at the end of January; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Correct.
Lead 2C: So you must have wanted to know, then, what the reasonable worst-case scenario was and what that meant for Northern Ireland; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: That would be an obvious question, wouldn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So where do we see you asking about that and what the implications of that are for Northern Ireland? Where do we –
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think we were briefed on the reasonable worst-case scenario certainly in an Executive meeting by the Chief Medical Officer, I can’t remember the date, it would have been in either mid-February to early March, he would have talked about the reasonable worst-case scenario, because – the reason I remember that phrase is that, not being from a health or medical background myself, there were a lot of different phrases coming forward, my Lady, that needed to be understood. In fact there was an enormous amount of medical terms coming towards us at that time, and we were asking what they meant.
Lead 2C: And you must have wanted to know what sort of infrastructure there was in Northern Ireland in order to be able to respond to a pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I mean, that would be probably about as basic as it gets –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – for the leader of a country. Where, at the end of January 2020, do we see you asking those sorts of questions?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, it’s not in the Executive meetings, but we were asking our officials offline what was happening, hence the setting up of the CCG on 20 February, because not all discussions between ministers take place in the Executive Committee.
Lead 2C: I think what you’ve said in your witness statement is that certainly in February 2020 it was the Executive Committee meetings that were the source of the information to you –
Baroness Arlene Foster: From (inaudible).
Lead 2C: – about updating about the pandemic, so I just want to be clear that that’s correct and that, when it came to information about the pandemic, it was the Executive Committee meetings –
Baroness Arlene Foster: So.
Lead 2C: – that were the source of your information?
Baroness Arlene Foster: So the source of the information meaning the information that was brought to us by the Minister of Health to the Executive Committee meetings. That doesn’t mean that we weren’t asking questions outside of the Executive Committee meetings about what they meant. And because, as I say, I had a special adviser who was a medical doctor I was able to ask him if there was anything I didn’t quite understand.
Lead 2C: Right. So when we get to February 2020, what were you being told, then, about the plans that existed, the infrastructure that existed, to respond to the pandemic in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Of course there’s two elements to that, my Lady, there’s the health infrastructure that needed to be in place, and then there’s the infrastructure to deal with whatever was coming in terms of the pandemic, and not all pandemics, of course, are of the same scale as what came towards us, because in the past we’d had swine flu and issues like that, and of course they weren’t of the same scale as to what was coming. So we were taking advice as to what needed to be done. And, as I say, that’s why CCG was stood up on 20 February.
Lead 2C: So is every question that I ask you about planning and what you knew about, is it going to come back to the setting up of the CCG meeting?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I think those were our emergency response structures, yes.
Lead 2C: So, coming back to my question, then, in terms of what you were told about the infrastructure that existed in Northern Ireland to respond to a pandemic in February 2020, what were you told?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, we were told about the Department of Health’s preparation, although that didn’t really come to the Executive until March when we heard about their surge plans and what they were doing in hospitals.
Again, in the Department of Justice, they were looking at mortuaries and having to deal with those who had passed away and how they could deal with that, at a site in Belfast. The Department of Education were setting about planning, although it was something that we didn’t want to consider, what would happen to schools in those sorts of circumstances.
So there were plans being undertaken by the different departments.
Lead 2C: I think all of those plans all involved getting to a stage, if you’re talking about the sensitive plans on the part of the Department of Justice, or hospital plans, those are all about what you do once the virus is in a country and once the worst has happened. What was happening, what were the plans in Northern Ireland to stop the worst from happening?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Sorry, I don’t understand the question.
Lead 2C: Well, the sorts of plans that you’re talking about are what happens when the virus has reached Northern Ireland –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – and is causing hospitals to be overrun and causing schools to shut down; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: What were the plans in February to try to stop that from happening in the first place?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, my Lady, I think it was the policy to delay and then contain the virus. I don’t think at any stage there was any suggestion we were going to be able to keep the virus from coming to Northern Ireland. I think it was accepted that it would arrive here, and it did in late February, as I recall, arrive into Northern Ireland.
Lead 2C: I’m going to go to the Executive Committee minutes from February 2020 to consider the extent of discussion that there was with the Minister of Health.
If we could go, please, to INQ000065706.
We don’t have a minute for 2 February, Baroness Foster, this is the first one that we’ve got, and I think that we have to go to page 5 before we get to it.
There’s certainly no detailed information there, is there, about testing capacity, tracing capacity, hospital capacity?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No.
Lead 2C: There’s nothing there about the reasonable worst-case scenario and what that might mean in Northern Ireland, is there?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, not in the minutes, no.
Lead 2C: If we scroll down a bit, please.
No one asks any questions about that either, do they?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I think we were definitely, my Lady, in receive mode in respect of what Robin was telling us in connection with what he had learnt from both COBR and from both his own – and from his own advisers as well.
Lead 2C: Could we go, please, to the next meeting.
INQ000065692, and could we go to page 3, please.
We can see reference to there being 12 places to carry out tests.
If we could scroll down, please, there’s some mention of the legislation. Reference a few lines down – thank you – to the health service being in “containment phase”.
I think there’s some measure of emergency legislation. And then items set out below, those are all items to do with the emergency legislation; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: If we go down, please, thank you.
We’ve seen before, there’s a reference to “Coronavirus (see above)”, but there doesn’t appear to be any further discussion; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: It’s cursory, isn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: We had, you see reference there to, my Lady, an urgent decision that had been taken, that was in relation to clauses for the UK Coronavirus Bill for our inclusion in that Bill, so that indicates that we were doing things outside of the Executive in terms of preparation.
Lead 2C: The Bill?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, those had been approved by the First and deputy First Minister before they went.
Lead 2C: So the regulations that had been drafted in the United Kingdom were amended for the purposes of Northern Ireland; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Correct.
Lead 2C: So, to the extent that that amounted to any planning, that was just the amendment of regulations that had been drafted in another place; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, but it was important, my Lady, that we had the appropriate legislative cover for Northern Ireland. Because our legislation is slightly different, we’re still operating under the 1967 Public Health Act, which had been amended in England and Wales but hasn’t been amended in Northern Ireland.
Lead 2C: But that doesn’t amount to any sort of substantive planning, does it, in terms of infrastructure, testing, ensuring that there’s hospital capacity? It doesn’t touch on any of those things –
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do accept that it doesn’t touch on those things, but I also say that it’s important to have the legislative cover to act if and when we do need to.
Lead 2C: That might be thought to be the very least of it, don’t you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I do think having legislation in place is – I wouldn’t describe it as being at the very least of it; I think it’s important that it was there.
Lead 2C: Can we go to the minutes, please, at INQ000273788.
This is 24 February, Baroness Foster.
I think if we go, please – I think we have to scroll all the way to page 9.
24 February, and there’s barely anything in these notes about Covid-19; do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I do agree, yes.
Lead 2C: “Still in containment phase.”
That’s pretty much it.
Standing back from all of that, do you agree that the Executive Committee in Northern Ireland brought virtually no scrutiny to the pandemic or the plans for the pandemic in February 2020?
Baroness Arlene Foster: My Lady, I wouldn’t say that we had no scrutiny, but I do – by way of explanation and certainly not by way of an excuse, one has to look at everything else that was going on at that particular point in time. We had only came back into government, we were trying to set up a programme of government to deal with all of the things that had been left sitting for three years. And I know that the Inquiry has heard evidence in relation to the preparedness of the Northern Ireland system, in terms of its emergency procedures being 18 months behind, and yet that wasn’t identified to us in our first-day brief or indeed brought to our attention.
So I do accept that there should have been more scrutiny at that time. As I say, I tried to explain why that didn’t happen, but it’s certainly not an excuse.
Lead 2C: Just coming back to the legislation, if we could go, please, to INQ000390947, please.
So we can see this is a reference back to the urgent decision, I think, that you were referring to; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: We can see at paragraph 2 the minister sets out that it’s a cross-cutting issue, that he was taking the lead; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And I think we can be clear, and he’s explained this, that despite – that he was the health minister and that this Bill touched upon many aspects of other departments, that nonetheless he was the person who was sponsoring it or bringing it forward; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: If we go, please, to page 2, and again we can see set out here that he was explaining that:
“… it was appropriate to … prepare for [a] reasonable worst case scenario … COVID-19 pandemic moderate severity, without a vaccine.”
Yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: And paragraph 5, please.
So, again, just setting out some of the fairly stark figures by that point; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: If we could go to page 5, please. This sets out, doesn’t it, Baroness Foster, for example, that previous exercises had identified gaps in capabilities – we see that at paragraph 2 – to overcome a severe pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Yes? Thank you.
And reference there to some of the work programme, yes –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – related to the Bill.
So again, just to be clear, that was in the middle of February, so again reinforcement, do you agree, that what was being prepared for was this reasonable worst-case scenario; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, and I think it’s interesting that in that paragraph that describes the reasonable worst-case scenario, again it’s indicated that we’re using our pandemic flu plans as the way forward, and that was certainly my recollection at the time.
Lead 2C: Yes, and again I don’t think we see any papers or any requests from you to officials in your department asking for any sort of briefing, submission, detail on what the reasonable worst-case scenario – how that might eventuate in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, as I’ve indicated, the Chief Medical Officer would have briefed us on that issue, although I accept it’s not in the minutes, as has been shown to me. And as I’ve indicated as well, my special adviser was a medical doctor, so I would have asked him what that meant.
Lady Hallett: Did anybody ever discuss with you that if this new virus was asymptomatic, there was asymptomatic transmission, that the pandemic flu plans might not be appropriate?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Certainly not in February.
Lady Hallett: Can you remember roughly when that was first –
Baroness Arlene Foster: I have a recollection of an Executive meeting, I think it was in March, when we were talking about the transmission of the virus and the Chief Medical Officer indicating that it could be lifted from surfaces and that that was a huge problem and why social isolation was something that we had to look at, and making sure that everybody – you know, the basics of washing hands, not touching your face after you’ve touched a surface. So I do have a recollection of that, and I think it was in March time.
Ms Dobbin: You said in your witness statement at paragraph 53, I don’t think we need to bring it up, that you would have been aware of the World Health Organisation advice of 24 February.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So you would have been aware that that advice was to the effect that there needed to be the highest level of national response; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes. That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: That there needed to be or there needed to be ensured an all-of-government and all-of-society approach; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: With non-pharmaceutical –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Interventions.
Lead 2C: – public health measures; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And that there needed to be active, exhaustive case finding and immediate testing, isolation, and painstaking contact tracing; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And rigorous quarantine; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And again, despite you apparently being aware of that advice having been given, there’s no evidence, is there, that you sought any briefings or asked for any detailed papers to be provided to you, setting out, for example, what that sort of all-society approach might require in Northern Ireland; do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do agree, but I would have thought that the setting up of our emergency structures would have been the all-society response, and I say response in terms of when the virus came to Northern Ireland.
Lead 2C: So, again, sorry, just to be – I want to be clear whether or not you’re talking about the institution of the CCG meeting or are you talking about the response on 16 March?
Baroness Arlene Foster: The CCG meeting was the beginning of our emergency procedures being put in place, but the – as you are aware, my Lady, the actual structure wasn’t put in place until after 16 March. So the head of the Civil Service brought officials together on 20 February, and I’ve heard the evidence about the content of that meeting, and then the actual structure of NICCMA wasn’t set up until after that.
Lead 2C: Okay, I wonder if I could bring up, please, paragraph 38 of your witness statement. You said there:
“In TEO by end of January, NICCMA was being set up and I believe officials were looking at those aspects of emergency arrangements that fell outwith the health portfolio …”
Can you just be clear –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – as to what you mean by NICCMA being set up by the end of January?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think that’s not exact – I can see why you would ask that question, because that’s not phrased in the appropriate way. NICCMA was being set up, I think what I mean by that, it was being considered as to when it was going to be put in place as opposed to being set up. So I do apologise to the Inquiry for that clumsy wording.
Lead 2C: Yes. Well, it’s not clumsy; it’s just not right, is it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yeah. Absolutely. Well, in terms of – there were discussions taking place about NICCMA, but it wasn’t being set up at that time, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: In terms of your awareness about the state of civil contingencies arrangements in Northern Ireland, you I think say in your witness statement at paragraph 21 – I don’t think I need to take you to it – that you were not aware of the January 2020 paper about sector resilience in civil contingencies. That’s the paper that said that Northern Ireland was 18 months –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Oh yes.
Lead 2C: – behind the rest of the United Kingdom.
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, I wasn’t aware of that paper.
Lead 2C: Did you know that within the civil contingencies branch in Northern Ireland there was regarded to be a critical lack of resources in January 2020?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I did not, and as I’ve already indicated, my Lady, it was not flagged as an issue of concern in my first-day brief.
Lead 2C: Were you aware of the PwC report known as the futures report, which was written in November 2019 and which made 85 separate recommendations about civil contingencies in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I was not aware of that.
Lead 2C: Were you aware of a paper that was provided to the TEO board on 25 February that said that civil contingencies arrangements in Northern Ireland hadn’t been reviewed for the past 20 years and said that a review was needed in order to ensure that effective arrangements are in place in the Executive to support wider citizens and wider society in the event of an unforeseen emergency event or situation?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I wouldn’t have been privy to TEO board papers.
Lead 2C: Were you aware, I think it’s correct at this time, I think, that there were only about two staff in the Civil Contingencies Policy Branch?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I was not aware of that.
Lead 2C: And are you or were you not aware of any of those things because you hadn’t asked any questions about civil contingencies capacity in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: As I’ve indicated, my Lady, it was not flagged as a matter of concern in my first-day brief, I was aware that the civil contingencies had been put in place for a no-deal Brexit, Yellowhammer, I probably therefore believed that the civil contingencies branch was in a good state, and I regret now not asking that very question, and instead assuming, because it had been stood up to deal with those no-Brexit issues, that it was in a good state.
Lead 2C: Why would arrangements that had been designed for an EU exit be necessarily suitable or appropriate for the kind of response that might be required in the context of a pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Because in TEO our function is to co-ordinate the response and therefore it would have been about co-ordinating the response for the pandemic, just as we had got ready, although in the end we didn’t need to do it, have to co-ordinate the response in respect of a no-deal Brexit.
Lady Hallett: Is that a convenient moment?
Ms Dobbin: It is, thank you.
Lady Hallett: Just from what I’ve heard about Yellowhammer, one of the principles was that civil servants were recruited, so I think the whole point about Yellowhammer was preparing the numbers of staff, so that should have been the impact –
The Witness: Sure.
Lady Hallett: By the sounds of it, in Northern Ireland it wasn’t.
Very well, 11.30.
(11.16 am)
(A short break)
(11.30 am)
Lady Hallett: Ms Dobbin.
Ms Dobbin: Thank you.
Baroness Foster, before the short adjournment I was asking you some questions about civil contingencies arrangements in Northern Ireland, and asking you about your level of awareness as to how depleted they had become, and I think that you confirmed that you didn’t know that, and I think the question that I was asking you was whether or not that was because you hadn’t made any enquiry of your department or asked to see, for example, what the civil contingency planning looked like for the response to the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, my Lady, if the deputy First Minister and I sat down and tried to think about all of the things that we wanted to ask questions about and didn’t know about, we would have been a long time going through all of that. So, no, I didn’t know about the state of preparedness in terms of civil contingencies. I should have known, and it should have been brought to me, and, whilst I accept you will take a different position, I believe that the civil servants should have brought it to me.
Lead 2C: Well, throughout the course of February, the picture was building, wasn’t it, as to just how serious the position was in respect of Covid-19; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, it was.
Lead 2C: And you would have seen, for example – I’m sure you didn’t need a briefing to tell you about the lockdowns that had taken place in Italy in February, for example; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, towards the end of February, that’s right.
Lead 2C: I think from about 21 February, I’m sure that someone will correct me if I’m wrong about that.
Obviously COBR had continued to meet, hadn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: We’ve already seen that you were aware of the World Health Organisation declaration. So one might have thought that perhaps, coming towards the end of February, that it might have crystallised that there was a need on your part to ascertain what the civil contingencies arrangements were in Northern Ireland for responding to this oncoming pandemic.
Did you ask that question, or ask to look at those plans?
Baroness Arlene Foster: My Lady, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect civil servants to alert if there were matters of concern in relation to those issues. I think it was reasonable for me to expect that those plans were in place. We were aware the CCG had met on 20 February. If there were particular issues around resourcing, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect those to have been brought to us, given what was going on, but they weren’t.
Lead 2C: What about the broader plans, Baroness Foster? What about the plans that were being put in place across government in Northern Ireland to respond to the pandemic? Did you ask to see those?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I have no right, my Lady, to demand that those plans are brought to me, because, I’ve already indicated, I don’t hold the same position as the Scottish First Minister or the Welsh First Minister. I’m in a mandatory coalition where each department has their own remit, and therefore I would have been satisfied that the CCG had been stood up and that the departments would be working to their plans.
Lead 2C: You didn’t have to demand to see anything, did you? You could have convened a meeting of your ministerial colleagues and asked them to bring their plans to the table, asked them, not demanded it of them, couldn’t you?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s not the way mandatory coalition works in Northern Ireland.
Lead 2C: What, that in the face of a global pandemic you can’t say to your colleagues, “Shall we sit down together and work out what we’re all doing to respond”?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think it’s clear from the minutes later on that when we did try to have a more collegiate central role in terms of the pandemic that we were pushed back on that, because people understandably, and I’m not criticising colleagues for this, believed that they have their own remit in their own department and that they are the lead person in respect of that.
I respect that, because I’ve grown up in politics through the mandatory coalition system. Is it a good system for governance? Is it an efficient system for governance? No, it’s not, my Lady. That’s the point. But it’s the system that we have, that was given us to by the Belfast Agreement, and it’s there for a reason. And no doubt we will talk about the cross-community vote system later on in evidence, but that’s the system we have due to the Belfast Agreement.
Lead 2C: Baroness Foster, I don’t think you can deflect every question that’s put to you by reference to mandatory coalition.
Baroness Arlene Foster: I’m not deflecting any questions whatsoever, I’m answering the questions to the best of my ability.
Lead 2C: Did you ask any of your ministerial colleagues in February 2020 if you could sit round a table and discuss planning for the pandemic with them?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I did not.
Lead 2C: Could we look, please, at paragraph 68 of your witness statement.
That’s at page 21, so it’s INQ000418976.
The first couple of lines of that read:
“As DoH was leading the pandemic response, NICCMA was to be activated when DoH asked for it to be activated.”
Do you accept that that part of your witness statement is wrong?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I don’t think it’s wrong, I think it was a statement of the reality we’re working to. If you’re suggesting that I am saying that we couldn’t have set it up, that’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying that it was to be activated when DoH asked for it to be activated. And if you look at the correspondence between officials at that time, they were waiting for the Health Department to ask for it to be activated.
Lead 2C: Well, I think that the Health Department was providing advice at that point in time. It doesn’t appear that they were seeking to say that this meant that TEO couldn’t stand up the civil contingencies arrangements.
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think there is, in some of the emails, that it was too soon to set up the civil contingencies, because it was going to take people away from planning. So I think that that is the case, that we were waiting for them to say when was the optimum moment to set it up.
Lead 2C: So, and again can we just be clear about this, is that your evidence, then, that whether or not to set up civil contingencies arrangements was something that you were waiting to be told by the Department of Health?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Not being told, but they were the lead department. And I know that that’s not something that the Inquiry likes to hear me say, but that’s the reality of the way we were working at that time: they were the lead department and therefore we were waiting to hear from them.
Lead 2C: And even though these were the civil contingencies arrangements for the whole of Northern Ireland, not for the Department of Health?
Baroness Arlene Foster: But it was – it was principally a health emergency.
Lead 2C: When did it stop being principally a health emergency in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think when we started to implement non-pharmaceutical interventions.
Lead 2C: So in and or around 16 March, or later than that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: In and around the 16th. I think schools closed, from memory, on 18 March, and at that time we had been speaking about vulnerable elderly people and shielding as well, so it became a non-health issue then, because it was obviously impacting on society more broadly.
Lead 2C: The part of this paragraph that I actually wanted to go to was the second line:
“However, TEO had been making preparations prior to this. As set out in the Submission of 3 March 2020 on Covid-19 Preparedness and Response, TEO convened a meeting of the CCG on 20 February … and had begun daily engagement with Cabinet Office, Civil Contingencies Secretariat, and other devolved administrations.”
Yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So again, just coming back to that, as I understand your evidence, Baroness Foster, that is the principal part of the TEO that was responding to the pandemic; is that right? Or that that was the structural response in Northern Ireland in the TEO –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – to the pandemic. So there was a single meeting, wasn’t there, one meeting on 20 February 2020, before 18 March –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: – correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: Have you seen, it’s been shown to a number of witnesses, what was discussed at that meeting and what the priorities were?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think I have seen that, yes.
Lead 2C: If you have, because I don’t want to be unfair, but if you’ve seen it, perhaps we could bring it up.
INQ000023220.
We’ve seen, Baroness Foster, that these were the priorities in Northern Ireland at this time.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Do you agree that it’s a matter of deep concern that these were the priorities for planning for a pandemic in Northern Ireland on 20 February?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think those were the – the first three are issues of concern that have obviously been brought by the different departments. The last bullet point, in terms of readiness, my Lady, is to give an indicator to the different departments that they need to get ready for the reasonable worst-case scenario.
Lead 2C: I think you’re misunderstanding me, and perhaps I didn’t ask the question clearly enough. Do you consider it to be a matter of deep concern that these are the priorities in Northern Ireland in February 2020 for planning for a pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: But the CCG is a co-ordinating role. The different departments would have been planning in their own particular way. Those are issues of concern that have obviously been brought to the centre, that’s why they’ve been registered in the way that they have, and then the different departments would work through their issues with their ministers.
Lead 2C: So you don’t think it’s a matter of concern, then, that those were the priorities?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, sorry, these are the priorities that have been brought from the departments as matters of concern at that point in time.
So I don’t see why – it’s not a planning exercise, it’s actually people coming from their departments and saying “Here are our issues of concern at this point in time”.
Lead 2C: So what this seems to suggest is that these are the most important things that need to be done in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think they’re the most urgent things that needed to be done at that point in time on 20 February.
Lead 2C: Yes, and even if we take it on that basis, this doesn’t cause you any concern?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I’m not sure what issue you’re trying to raise with me.
Lead 2C: Well, if this is the only meeting that takes place in Northern Ireland of the civil contingencies organisation, and that these are the things that they regard as being the priorities, so, for example, storage of the remains of people, that there mightn’t be a power to close higher education – in other words, that there aren’t a number of priorities going to the core functions of every department and what they need to do in order to respond to a pandemic. Where do we see any consideration of that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: You have to remember this is 20 February, we haven’t any cases of Covid-19 at this point in time. I accept that there should have been more identification particularly in and around elderly people, and how they were going to be dealt with. So instead of dealing with excess deaths storage, why were we not hearing about the care home facilities and how they were going to be dealt with? But, as I say, these were issues that were raised from the different departments to the centre. I’ve already indicated that, in my view, CCG and NICCMA is a response organisation, it’s not a policy body, and that’s why – I can see the questions you’re asking, but those are coming up from the different departments.
Lead 2C: So where was the scrutiny, Baroness Foster, of or by ministers in Northern Ireland as to what was being done at this level in order to plan for the pandemic in February 2020?
Baroness Arlene Foster: This isn’t a scrutiny body, it’s a co-ordination body.
Lead 2C: No, where is the scrutiny of it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, so I accept that, yes.
Lead 2C: There wasn’t any, was there?
Baroness Arlene Foster: There wasn’t any scrutiny in relation to the issues that were brought.
Lead 2C: There wasn’t any scrutiny at all, was there, by the Executive Committee in February 2020 of the response to the pandemic at all, was there?
Baroness Arlene Foster: In our structure, and this is not a deflection, before that is raised, the committees are the scrutiny of the ministers’ decisions, it is not really the work of other ministers to mark the homework of their ministerial colleagues.
Lead 2C: So it was no part of your role, Baroness Foster, in the response to the pandemic to, even if exercised as a collective responsibility, understand what state Northern Ireland was in and whether it was capable of responding to a pandemic; is that what you’re suggesting?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, what I’m suggesting is I think it was reasonable to expect that the pandemic plans were being developed by our officials and if there were gaps in the planning, if there were things that weren’t being dealt with, that we would have been alerted to that.
Lead 2C: So again, it’s a question of people drawing things to your attention rather than you seeking to assure yourself that Northern Ireland was in a fit state to respond to the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, my Lady, I think there is a duty on civil servants to inform their ministers in relation to issues of concern that have come across their desks, and because we have the policy powers, and I do say that we had been out of government for three years, and it may be the case that the civil servants had got used to the fact that they didn’t have to do submissions to their ministers in relation to issues. That’s not criticism of them, it’s just the way they had been working during those three years. And this was just literally a month after we had come back into office.
Lead 2C: What was your responsibility at this time, Baroness Foster?
Baroness Arlene Foster: A wide-ranging responsibility –
Lead 2C: No, I mean in respect of the pandemic.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, as I’ve already indicated, we were reliant, heavily reliant, probably too heavily reliant, on briefings from the Minister of Health in relation to what was happening.
Lead 2C: That’s not an answer.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, it is an answer, and it’s the answer I’m giving to the Inquiry.
Lead 2C: I’m asking you what your responsibilities were or how you discharged your responsibilities to Northern Ireland as the leader of its government in respect of the pandemic during that time?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I’ve already answered that question.
Lead 2C: I’m going to move on.
Could we please go to INQ000065694.
So these are the minutes of 2 March.
Perhaps if we may just scroll through these, if we could. Thank you. We can just keep scrolling.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: I think – thank you – we see here set out for the Executive Committee that the fatality rate could be 2% to 3%; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: If we could just please scroll down a little more.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: If we could just go past this point to ensure that that’s all of the discussion, please. Yes.
So, again, we can see that there’s maybe a little bit more discussion, Baroness Foster, but again, there’s no detailed, considered discussion about plans, the ability of the health service to withstand the pandemic, testing capacity, any of that kind of information that one might expect by this stage; do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I think this is the first substantive meeting where the CMO came to brief us. And as you will see in that briefing, he indicated that it was not like a flu, the virus was different, and that was him alerting us to that fact, I think probably for the first time, although I stand to be corrected.
And I think, if I may, my Lady, we were all in a state of shock at this meeting. It was really a very sober assessment of where we were at.
Lead 2C: And it doesn’t appear to have prompted any consideration for a joint meeting about planning, does it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I think we were absorbing a lot of information, a lot of new information, at that time, and you will see we broke off the meeting to go to our first – well, in terms of First and deputy First Minister, our first COBR meeting, and that was remotely, obviously, from the Department of Health.
Lead 2C: So alarm bells were now ringing with you; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Very loudly.
Lead 2C: Very loudly.
Could we go, please, to INQ000418976. Forgive me, that was the wrong … it’s INQ000065695, sorry.
So these are the meeting minutes of 10 March, Baroness Foster, and if we could go, please, to page 3, and we’ll scroll down, Baroness Foster, so that you can see it in context.
Sorry, could we just scroll up to page 2, please.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: I think we can see reference there, a few lines up, to “vulnerable people – over 70s”.
If we scroll down, please, thank you.
And then we can see you, at the top:
“Civil Contingencies.
“- have we got plans to handle – advice to organisations/companies?”
If you were alarmed at the meeting on 2 March, it doesn’t seem to have crystallised or led you to have given any thought, does it, to civil contingencies in that week? I say that because you seem to be asking possibly the most fundamental and basic question that could possibly be asked by this stage: have we got plans to handle?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, my Lady, just because it’s a basic question doesn’t mean that it shouldn’t be asked. I mean, I’ve been criticised for not asking questions, and now I’m asking questions and I’m being criticised for that as well, in terms of the terms of the questions.
So I think I was trying – we had been in London – I had been in London the day before, at the COBR meeting, and I had obviously taken into consideration what I’d heard there and I was wanting to make sure that we had our plans in place. And as you can see, I asked:
“Who leads on advice.”
And the head of the Civil Service says, below:
“CMO’s advice.”
So it was clear that the CMO was the lead person giving advice.
Lead 2C: It wasn’t the way the question was asked, Baroness Foster, that I was putting to you, it was the fact that it’s only on 10 March 2020 that you’re asking the question: have we got plans to handle?
Baroness Arlene Foster: But I wanted to be assured that they were in place at that time. Because, as I say, I’d been to COBR the day before and the week before, I wanted to make sure our plans were in place as well. I think in a previous minute you will have seen me asking had we the same legislative powers as England, to make sure that that was in place. I don’t think because a question’s basic that it shouldn’t be asked.
Lead 2C: What you’re asking is: have we got plans?
Have we got plans? On 10 March. In respect of a pandemic –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, and the CCG had been set up on 20 February, so I was expecting an answer in the affirmative, and I was expecting to be told what those plans were.
Lead 2C: And I think we see, I won’t go – perhaps if we just go on to page 3, please.
Lady Hallett: That is page 3.
Ms Dobbin: Sorry. Yes, we can see that there’s some reference there, for example, to risk assessments.
I think that we can be clear, then, Baroness Foster, and perhaps this really lays bare that up until this point in time you appeared just not to have known whether there were plans to respond to the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s not the case.
Lead 2C: It’s also right that we haven’t seen, until this point in time, so 10 March, we haven’t seen any information or briefing about what the worst reasonable case scenario might translate into in Northern Ireland either, in terms of numbers of people, the health system, the ability of the health system to withstand the sorts of numbers who might become ill?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, but those would have been brought to us by the department in terms of the numbers, and that’s why I – the numbers were brought to us on 2 March, not in terms of numerical but in terms of percentage –
Lead 2C: Yes.
Baroness Arlene Foster: – modelling and, as I say, it was certainly a shocking statistic.
Lead 2C: Well, I think that you’re first told of the figures, I mean, we’ll come to it, there’s no translation of the – and I’m going to be careful what I say, because I’m not entirely clear or sure of what it is that Minister Swann’s calculation was, but I think 19 March is the first time we see any specific figures –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – being put to the Executive Committee; do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do, although, as I say, it was indicated that it was 2% back on 2 March, but I think until the numerical figures were spelt out, the scale was then really understood. Or the possible scale, I should say.
Lead 2C: Despite the reasonable worst-case scenario having been raised and in prospect, for a considerable time by 10 March, it doesn’t appear that there’s any sort of discussion – but you will know better than me – at the Executive Committee about capacity within hospitals or what the risk is to hospitals or health services in Northern Ireland. There doesn’t appear to be any consideration of those kind of practical, vital questions that might need to be asked.
Baroness Arlene Foster: There was a reference, I think, around – and I think it might be on 10 March – around moving people who were infected into different wards. But, again, that was because – we didn’t second-guess that because the scale was not apparent to us at the time, and as I’ve already indicated, my Lady, on 14 March the Chief Medical Officer was indicating that our peak, based on the modelling, was 14 weeks away at that stage. As it turned out, it was only four weeks away.
Lead 2C: When you went to the COBR meeting on 12 March, there was a presentation, wasn’t there, or a graph about the NHS and whenever it would get past the point of capacity and what that looked like? Do you recall that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I’m sure you’re right, but I can’t just recall it at the moment.
Lead 2C: Because, again, it doesn’t appear to have sparked or prompted any sort of scrutiny or questioning by ministers in Northern Ireland about the position in Northern Ireland and what that might mean for health services in Northern Ireland.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, well, as I’ve indicated, I think our feeling was that we had time to deal with those issues, and as it turned out, it came a lot quicker, in terms of the peak of the pandemic.
Lead 2C: If we could go, please, to the – forgive me. What happened next in time, that COBR meeting, was that test and trace was ended, wasn’t it –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – in Northern Ireland? And the United Kingdom moved, didn’t it, from the contain to the delay phase?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: What was your understanding at that time or what had you asked about test and trace in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, we had an Executive meeting on 12 March, and amongst other things it became clear that the testing and tracing had been paused by the Department of Health, and the answer, when asked – I think I might have been in the chair at the time, and when one is in the chair one tries to allow ministers to ask questions, so you will notice in the minutes, whoever’s in the chair tends not to ask the questions, but the questions were asked of Minister Swann and the answer was “I’d rather” – and I’m paraphrasing here – “I’d rather try to deal with what’s coming towards us than count”, in terms of the number of cases he had. So I think it was a capacity issue at that time.
Lead 2C: I was really asking, Baroness Foster, what questions you had asked prior to 12 March in order to understand what testing and tracing capacity there was in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I think I’ve indicated that it came up as an issue on March 12, and that’s when it was discussed and the Department of Health told us that they had paused the test and trace.
Lead 2C: So, again, can we be clear about this: that it was only when testing and tracing was suspended that you asked any questions about what Northern Ireland’s capability was to provide testing?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, testing was under the remit of the PHA at that time and was taking place, and I think it’s not unreasonable for us to ask why it was stopped, and you’ve seen the answer that was given to us by the Minister of Health at that time.
Lead 2C: It wasn’t a question about when it was stopped, Baroness Foster; it was a question as to whether you made any enquiry at all, until testing was paused, as to what Northern Ireland’s testing capability was?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, that’s the answer I have given in relation to the testing was under the public health authority which is under the Department of Health. When it was paused we asked why it had been paused. I don’t think that’s an unreasonable question.
Lead 2C: Sorry, is the answer to that straightforward question no?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I’ve given my answer.
Lead 2C: Is the answer no?
Baroness Arlene Foster: The answer is that testing was under the public health authority, which is reporting to the Department of Health.
Lady Hallett: Move on, I think, Ms Dobbin.
Ms Dobbin: Yes. Thank you, my Lady.
So testing and tracing stopped, Northern Ireland moved from the contain to the delay phase, and I think it’s right, Baroness Foster, that that was effectively a decision that was taken by government in Westminster and applied, effectively –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – in Northern Ireland, and that there was no discussion by the Executive Committee, for example, about whether or not in fact test and trace needed to be stopped in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: You were informed by the Department of Health –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Correct.
Lead 2C: – that it was stopping.
We understand and we’ve heard a good deal of evidence about the fact that the Republic of Ireland made an announcement that it would move to impose a number of restrictions, I think on 11 March; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: The 11th or 12th, yes.
Lead 2C: Yes, I’m not that the day matters too much. And I think that also coincided with the World Health Organisation declaring a pandemic; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And again, neither of those things, and perhaps if I take something that’s not political, perhaps, the declaration of the pandemic by the World Health Organisation, again that doesn’t seem to have prompted any consideration on your part as to whether or not now maybe the time had come to set up civil contingencies arrangements in Northern Ireland.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, my Lady, we were taking advice from SAGE in London, which was being brought to us by the Chief Medical Officer, and the advice was that we’d deploy interventions at “the right time”, and we took that at face value from the Chief Medical Office, and we agreed that there wouldn’t be school closures on that basis, because it wasn’t the right time to close schools and the medical advice was such that we agreed with it.
Lead 2C: SAGE weren’t – they weren’t giving advice about standing up civil contingencies arrangements –
Baroness Arlene Foster: No.
Lead 2C: – were they, because they’d been set up, I mean, from prior to 24 January –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – in Westminster?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And it’s now 12 March, in Northern Ireland. I mean, this might be thought to look like sleepwalking into a pandemic, Baroness Foster.
Baroness Arlene Foster: I totally reject that, my Lady, I absolutely reject that, and the idea that we would sleepwalk into a pandemic when we had had such a determination to work for the people of Northern Ireland, to represent our constituents in a devolved administration and that we would expose them to this in a wilful way is just offensive, frankly.
Lead 2C: Well, it’s just really difficult to understand why the most basic infrastructure for responding to a pandemic wasn’t activated even by the declaration of the pandemic by the World Health Organisation.
Baroness Arlene Foster: As I said, we were receiving our information from SAGE, and they had indicated that we should trigger interventions at “the right time”. The CCG had met on 20 February, albeit it hadn’t met again, and NICCMA was stood up on 16 March.
Lead 2C: I wanted to touch then, briefly, if I may, on the meeting on 16 March 2020.
That’s at INQ000065689.
This was the meeting that took place after the decision by the Republic of Ireland to impose measures or restrictions, and I think again we can just scroll through it, please, and I think …
(Pause)
Lead 2C: We see reference, and we’ve seen it already, I think, the deputy First Minister was referring to the fact that control had been lost two weeks ago.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: We can see reference there – we don’t need to stop – reference to 80% of the population getting Covid.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: If we could maybe just go forward, please, to page 17, I think this is the first time, Baroness Foster, that there’s any sort of reference or briefing to the Executive Committee about planning. Do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, indeed.
Lead 2C: And it says:
“[Departments] can prepare own plans but have to join up.”
Yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I think we can perhaps take it from that that this was being said because there was, and there had been, no joined up planning to date in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: There had been planning, my Lady, but not joined up, and I think that that’s why NICCMA was activated.
Lead 2C: I’m going to come to those plans in a second.
This was the meeting where there was debate and discussion about whether to close schools; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Correct.
Lead 2C: And there was a vote as to whether schools should close; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And it was just a – it was a straightforward majority vote, wasn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: It wasn’t a cross-community one?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No.
Lead 2C: And –
Baroness Arlene Foster: It was achieved through consensus.
Lead 2C: Well, that vote didn’t go through, did it? The vote that was put: should we close schools? –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes –
Lead 2C: – that was rejected?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That was rejected because the Department of Health and the Department of Justice believed that they should listen to the views of the Chief Medical Officer, and indeed of the head of the Civil Service, and therefore, along with ourselves, voted to keep schools open.
The Minister of Education had indicated to me that he needed time to plan the closure of schools in terms of vulnerable children, making sure that some schools were open for the children of key workers, so therefore the decision was taken not to close schools at that time.
Lead 2C: That’s one thing, but what you put to a vote was the motion that schools should close when the CMO advised it.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Correct? And why was a decision whether or not to close schools, why was that to be delegated to the Chief Medical Officer?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Because he was working with the Public Health Agency, had been working very closely with the Department of Education behind the scenes as well, and I know that the then minister, Peter Weir, was working very hard to make sure that he had plans in place to deal – trying to deal with things that would cause problems, so that’s why.
Lead 2C: Whether to close schools was – perhaps might be thought to be one of the most significant decisions that the Executive Committee could possibly take –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do, yes.
Lead 2C: And whether to close schools encompassed a whole range of considerations that cut across lots of different –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: – departments; yes? I mean, it raises fundamental issues about child protection, doesn’t it, about how children will be fed, it involves a decision based on all of those things, doesn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: It does indeed.
Lead 2C: It wasn’t a matter for the CMO to decide?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think it’s a misrepresentation to suggest that we weren’t taking those issues into consideration. I, looking at the Republic of Ireland decision, was concerned that they had closed schools without any plans and the Minister of Education, our Minister of Education was putting plans together because whilst we didn’t want to close schools, because we knew the impact it was going to have on our young people, we knew that was the direction of travel, therefore we would have to plan for it, and the trigger point for that would be when the CMO advised that we couldn’t keep them open any longer.
Lead 2C: The argument for closing schools was, I think, based partly on the fact that in fact lots of people had already decided to stop sending their children to school; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think unfortunately when the deputy First Minister decided to go public with her opinion on the closure of schools, that some of the schools in the Catholic maintained sector started to close, and therefore it was, to use the Minister of Education’s phrase at the time, fraying around the edges. And I think that was regrettable, because it was important that we had the plans in place to help those young people, who we knew weren’t going to be back in school for a considerable length of time. That was made clear to us, that once you close schools, schools are going to be closed for a long time. And we were very conscious of the fact that not every child has access to technology, not every child has a safe home environment, and we were concerned about that at the time.
Lead 2C: I think in terms of people stopping to – stopping sending their children – from – going to school, that that had already started to happen, and I think was discussed at a meeting of 12 March, before the deputy First Minister made her public statement.
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think that accelerated then some school closures after her statement. I mean, I think people were by this stage – we all were by this stage becoming very afraid, and people, understandably, were keeping their children at home because they didn’t want to – they didn’t know what way the virus worked, who it impacted the most, and therefore they were keeping their young people at home.
Lady Hallett: Do you think, Lady Foster, that you had sufficient information on how the closure of schools would impact on the transmission of the virus at that stage?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Later on we had more information, there’s no doubt about that, but at that stage, whilst we had been told that older people were more affected by the virus, there was – and you will recall this, no doubt – this idea that young people would infect older people by bringing the virus home to them, and so it was almost a societal issue about trying to protect our most vulnerable by cocooning everybody in a lockdown.
Lady Hallett: Because you didn’t have, at this stage, the epidemiological, kind of, advice that we got later in the pandemic –
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lady Hallett: – that I heard a lot about elsewhere, and I’m just wondering do you, it may be that the advice wouldn’t have been available anyway at this stage, but do you think you had sufficient sources of advice?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, we were heavily reliant on SAGE advice, as you know, and then that was synthesised first by the CMO. We didn’t see the minutes from SAGE in real time, we had the ability to see it later, if you know what I mean. And it would have been helpful for us to see the information at first hand, not putting any slight on the CMO at all in relation to that.
But we were in a sort of a situation where everything was happening very, very quickly, we were listening to the CMO, and his view from SAGE was that it wasn’t the right time to close schools. And as I understand it, that was the advice in the Republic of Ireland as well, but the Republic of Ireland took a political decision to close schools on 12 March.
Lady Hallett: Sorry to pursue this, it’s just that in Northern Ireland your Chief Medical Officer is – basically he’s Department of Health.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Correct.
Lady Hallett: So you don’t have the equivalent of Sir Chris Whitty.
Baroness Arlene Foster: No.
Lady Hallett: At the time you didn’t have the equivalent of Sir Patrick Vallance, because you didn’t have a government chief scientific officer, and I appreciate steps being taken to try to remedy the latter, but you still don’t have a government Chief Medical Officer in Northern Ireland or do you?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, we don’t and perhaps that’s something that needs to be reflected upon in government.
And I do recall the conversation, my Lady, around – later on in the pandemic, when we were trying to take in other considerations and we had that discussion with the CMO, and his point of view was “But I’m only looking at it from a health perspective and actually from a Covid perspective, I’m not looking at it from an economy perspective or indeed non-Covid health issues”. So that was a problem. But then how do you ever get a Chief Medical Officer to take into consideration economic issues?
Lady Hallett: You don’t. I heard from Sir Chris Whitty saying that you don’t.
Baroness Arlene Foster: And therein lies the problem, you know, that was a real issue.
Lady Hallett: Thank you.
Ms Dobbin: Thank you, my Lady.
Baroness Foster, just going back to the meeting on 16 March, I’m sure you’ve read those minutes, but people appear to have perhaps gone to default settings about the position they were taking, whether or not to close schools, but without very much consideration of what that would actually mean for children in Northern Ireland, and I’m referring to the content and the quality of the debate –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – at that meeting. Do you accept that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do, yes.
Lead 2C: I think if I may, we know that on the evening of 17 March – perhaps we could bring this up, INQ000308439, at page 2.
This is a reflection on that meeting:
“Even in a crisis they seem keener on scoring points off each other than helping the citizen.”
Again, Baroness Foster, reflecting on that, do you accept at this first challenge to ministers in Northern Ireland, the first decision that they’re called upon to make, that that was true, that it became about point scoring, not about children in Northern Ireland actually at all?
Baroness Arlene Foster: It was very disappointing that the decision that we had agreed on, I think a couple of days before, was then challenged by Sinn Féin ministers, because I believe, and I know this has been refuted by the deputy First Minister, that she wanted to be in the similar position to the Republic of Ireland, and whilst we were following what we were being told at that time, and I think doing the right thing in terms of preparing for school closures but not at that particular point, it descended into “them and us”, which is very disappointing.
And I think the exchange that we see on the screen is something, my Lady, that I referenced earlier. Officials are saying, you know, “We need a different decision-making structure”, “Never underestimate how difficult it is to get things agreed here”. I mean, we hadn’t had a government for three months – three years. Three months, if only. Three years. And officials had got used to making decisions without reference to ministers, and I think this is just a frustration coming through from the head of the Civil Service saying “We have the ministers back here and things are not simple any more”. Because it …
The five parties in the Executive, as you know, my Lady, are a wide range of views on many, many things, and therefore it is always difficult to gain consensus and to seek common ground. But unfortunately that’s the system we have.
Lead 2C: Baroness Foster, that’s candid of you, but it’s really sad and tragic, isn’t it, that –
Baroness Arlene Foster: It is.
Lead 2C: – when it came to children and this really important decision that ministers couldn’t just sit down and have a mature discussion and …?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I agree it’s a very bad reflection, very bad.
Lead 2C: I’ll move on to a different topic.
It’s just going back to the question of planning, Baroness Foster, because I think this all coalesces at around the same time that there was a bit of additional input into the TEO to help with planning, in the form of Ms Pearson.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I think when she came, she arrived, there was a plan in place.
And if we could just go to this, please, it’s INQ000086935, and perhaps if we could look at page 30 of this.
I’m just going to schools, Baroness Foster, because it’s an easy one to understand and everyone, I think, can see what the inadequacies of this plan are, and, if these were the risks on 13 March, that they just appeared wholly unrealistic.
Baroness Arlene Foster: But, if I may, my Lady, that’s at 13 March and I think over the next week there was a lot of intensive work carried out, which goes to the point that it would have been too soon to close the schools at that point, because a lot of work was then carried out in terms of children of key workers, making sure that children who got their only hot meal at school were able to – payment was going to be made so that they could have a meal at home. So there was a lot of work carried out between this document and the actual closing of schools.
Lead 2C: This document doesn’t really contemplate schools being closed at all by way of a non-pharmaceutical intervention. The risk, if we see school closures, what’s being planned for is that staff might be absent. As we can see, that’s the issue, that’s the risk.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yeah, but staff were still working during school closures, and I think the worry was that if they were not able to teach remotely, then that would be a problem.
Lead 2C: Well, I’m not –
Baroness Arlene Foster: And obviously for those schools that were open for key worker children as well, they needed to be in place as well.
Lead 2C: Well, I don’t think that can be right. This isn’t a plan for closing schools, and in fact we can see that the potential mitigation is larger school sizes. So it’s not – the risk isn’t: children are going to be off school, how do we plan for this? This is – the risk is: teachers won’t be in school, how do we plan for this?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, but I do think that the department had plans in place, because, as I understood it, there was legislation that they were putting in place if school closures had to be effected. I don’t think anybody wanted to close schools, I certainly didn’t want to close schools, but that’s where we ended up.
Lead 2C: Yes. Baroness Foster, it’s really just to draw your attention to what state of planning appeared to be on 13 March.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Sure.
Lead 2C: These are the plans that the Inquiry has been provided with in order to understand what the contingency planning was, and when it comes to schools, this is the state of the plans.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes. I accept that, but I also think, my Lady, that a lot of work was done in that week, which goes to show that we were right in not closing the schools at the same time as the Republic of Ireland.
Lead 2C: I think if I may I’ll move on and just deal then with the minutes of the 19 March, please.
That’s INQ000065737.
Again, I think we can see that the deputy First Minister appears to be exhorting people to work together, and reflecting, I think, on the pressure that was on the health minister. If we could, again, just please scroll down, thank you.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: Yes, we get to Covid now. And if we could just scroll down a little bit, please.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: I think if we could just stop, I think this is probably where we – we’ve obviously seen, Baroness Foster, that this was the day on which the first person in Northern Ireland died.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I think maybe – I’m not sure anyone had ever asked the question before, that we see at the bottom of page 4, which I think must be a reference to PPE.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And again, is that correct, had the Executive Committee asked any questions about the availability of PPE before this date?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I don’t think so, no.
Lead 2C: If we could just scroll down, please.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: Thank you, if we just pause there, please. I think this is the first time that there’s any reference to numbers or concrete figures in front of the Executive Committee. Do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So there were no figures discussed or considered by the Executive Committee until the first person had actually died in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, we only had percentage figures, I think, in terms of modelling, back in February.
Lead 2C: I think we can probably take that down, thank you.
Obviously very, very quickly, then, Baroness Foster, you were moving and Northern Ireland moved into a lockdown; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: I think that it’s also correct that – I think it’s correct for everywhere, I’m not suggesting that it’s just for Northern Ireland – that there hadn’t been any – well, certainly no advice, I think, from the CMO that a lockdown was in prospect or was needed in Northern Ireland in the run-up to 23 March; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, my understanding is that SAGE hadn’t modelled for a lockdown, and therefore we hadn’t been advised by our CMO about a lockdown, and I think partly that was because SAGE had believed that the British people wouldn’t really accept a lockdown because it was so anti what we believed in, in terms of being able to move around. So it’s absolutely the case that there was no planning for a lockdown in Northern Ireland, but in GB either.
Lady Hallett: There are some who argue you should never impose a lockdown, given the dire consequences for all of us. Did you and your Executive consider all the various consequences of a lockdown?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, because I think we were so frightened about the prospect of so many people losing their lives that we didn’t give it the due consideration that it probably should have been given. I think we probably would have ended up in the same place, my Lady, but certainly there was no discussion about: let’s not have a lockdown. It was happening, and that was it.
I think later on, and you will have seen this in the minutes, there was more discussion about how the virus was transmitted and whether a lockdown was correct for everybody in society. But certainly not at that time.
Ms Dobbin: I, on behalf of the Inquiry, asked Ms O’Neill whether she accepted that Northern Ireland was woefully unprepared for going into a lockdown, and she agreed with that, or she accepted that. Do you accept that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do, because I don’t think we were modelling or predicting that a lockdown would come. I think, by that stage, we knew that there was going to have to be some interventions. We had seen the lockdown in Italy, I think on 23 February. We had seen the television, photographs of people in their own homes and, frankly, thought it was: oh my goodness, this is terrible, that people aren’t allowed to move around. But then, as time went on, I think there wasn’t anybody saying that we shouldn’t do it when it arrived.
I mean, it was really turning the normal run of what you do – normally, in law, if you’re not allowed to do something, you’re allowed to do everything else, but this was telling you you’re not allowed to do anything unless it’s actually permitted in law.
So that shift was an incredible shift at that time and very difficult to contemplate.
Ms Dobbin: I was going to move on to a different topic, my Lady, but I don’t know, I can’t quite see the clock.
Lady Hallett: It’s 20 minutes to.
Ms Dobbin: I’m in your hands, if you would like me to –
Lady Hallett: Is it a five-minute or so –
Ms Dobbin: It’s not a five-minute or so topic, no.
Lady Hallett: In which case we will break now.
How are you doing for timing? Would you rather I broke until 1.40 or 1.45?
Ms Dobbin: I think I’m being told that we’re fine for time.
Lady Hallett: 1.45.
(12.40 pm)
(The short adjournment)
(1.46 pm)
Lady Hallett: Sorry if we’re late, both Lady Foster and I had lift malfunctions of different kinds.
Can I just say this, Lady Foster, before Ms Dobbin goes back to her questioning: you said something earlier that – you’re not the first person to say it and I wanted to make – this is not a point against you, it’s just to make plain for everybody. You said something like the Inquiry doesn’t want me to hear, or you attributed, basically to me, as the Inquiry, questions from Ms Dobbin.
Can I just reassure you and explain to everybody, questions asked by Counsel to the Inquiry do not indicate any conclusion that I’ve formed, or any views, they’re really designed to test the evidence to enable me to reach conclusions.
The Witness: I appreciate that.
Lady Hallett: So I just wanted to reassure you that I haven’t reached any conclusions as yet.
The Witness: Thank you.
Ms Dobbin: I’m grateful, my Lady.
Baroness Foster, before the short adjournment, I was going to move to a different topic and to a different phase in the pandemic, and look at what happened from autumn 2020 onwards. Before I do that, I just wanted to touch upon, with you, the attendance of the deputy First Minister at the funeral of Mr Storey. I think it’s clear from your witness statement that that was a matter which caused you personal difficulty and difficulty with your – in your relationship with her; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: I think that it’s also right that for a period of some weeks thereafter you didn’t feel able to stand on a platform with her, so to speak, in order to give the press conferences that you had been giving previously; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that is correct, yes.
Lead 2C: All right. I think it’s probably clear enough from your statement, and I hope I’m not mischaracterising it, but it may be a matter of personal hurt or difficulty to you?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think that’s a fair comment. At the beginning of June, the deputy First Minister and I had actually given an interview to the Belfast Telegraph about how we were trying to work together after a sometimes bumpy start in terms of school closures, criticism of Minister Swann, and we were trying to work together through those difficulties.
So it was a huge disappointment, and indeed caused massive damage to the Executive, to the credibility of the Executive, to public messaging, and was very hurtful to the so many people around Northern Ireland who had stuck by what were very stringent rules around funerals and wakes, in particular, because, as I’m sure evidence has been given, my Lady, around the culture in Northern Ireland, they have wakes and – to grieve together as neighbours, and all of that had been prohibited, and yet here was one of the people making the rules actually doing just so.
So it was a huge disappointment. Personally I felt very upset about it all, and I didn’t feel there was any credibility in going back to press conferences at that time. The press conferences began again in September. I think at that stage Michelle had acknowledged the hurt that had been caused, I think was the phrase that was used at that time, and in particular the damage to messaging, and given where we were then going, I felt it was important that we started to give those public messages again.
Lead 2C: Yes. I think we can see, just picking up the chronology, that that happened and that you – when I say you moved on, that you did resume giving those press conferences together, and obviously the Executive Committee, we can see, fell into a rhythm of meeting, because it had agreed a structure, hadn’t it, by which it would remove restrictions?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I think that framework, I won’t bring it up, was put in place I think in May 2020.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And you, I think the Executive Committee agreed some principles by which it would gradually remove restrictions; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And test the removal as well; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think there was a matrix drawn up where, it might have been later actually, the matrix where we would look at the risk and benefit from removing regulations and the CMO and the Department of Health would have told us whether they thought it was a negative or a positive place, so we felt that that was a good way to look at the regulations.
Lead 2C: And I think we can see that on their advice there would be – a restriction might be removed and then a period of time allowed to pass, and then a decision taken whether or not to remove another restriction; I think that was broadly the process?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think it was, we would act and then we would pause and then we would see how that had an impact on principally the reproduction number but also other issues as well, hospital admissions, capacity and things like that.
Lead 2C: Yes, and I think we see in that document, I think there are a number of principles that were intended to guide your decision-making, one of them I think was proportionality?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: One of them was keeping R below 1. So you had a framework around which to base your decisions; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, we had a framework, and also, bearing in mind what the regulations themselves said, which was if a regulation is no longer required then the Department of Health must remove that regulation. So there was a necessity issue as well, whether it was necessary to keep that regulation in place.
Lead 2C: Yes, and I think we’ve established this with other witnesses, Baroness Foster, and I won’t take you back to the materials, but it would appear that that process had worked for a period and that the R number actually went down by quite a bit in Northern Ireland in and around the summer of –
Baroness Arlene Foster: In the summer, yes, but we did understand, and we had been advised as well, that there was a seasonal element to it as well in terms of the virus became more transmissible in winter rather than in the summer months.
Lead 2C: Baroness Foster, I’m going to hopefully cover the chronology without needing to take you to any document, but if at any point you want to see a document, please say and I will take you to it.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Okay.
Lead 2C: I think we can see, if we pick the chronology up on 19 August 2020, I think Minister Swann met with you and the CMO and the CSA, and at that stage the R value was higher in Northern Ireland than the rest of the United Kingdom or the Republic of Ireland. Do you recollect that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do, yes.
Lead 2C: I think at around that time, there were some concerns about whether or not to go down the enforcement route, that a decision was ultimately taken on 10 September to consider localised restrictions in some areas?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think at that meeting in August the Chief Medical Officer had indicated that there were enough regulations in place, it’s just that they weren’t being enforced properly and that caused us some concern. Then in particular areas, actually some of them quite close to the Republic of Ireland border, there then became an exponential rise and there was a need to put restrictions in, and for the first time we did it on a localised postcode basis. I think in England they had different tiers, whereas we had, for this particular point in time, postcodes.
Lead 2C: I think in fact in terms of the areas, if we started, I think, the first restrictions were introduced in and around 10 September 2020, I think in fact Belfast was the main area of concern at around that time?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, and then moved, I think, to Ballymena, and to Derry and Strabane.
Lead 2C: Yes. I think, again just moving forward in time, I think by a week later the transmission rates were still higher than the rest of the UK and the Republic of Ireland and that the increases had been seen in Antrim and Newtownabbey, they seem to have been recorded as the main concerns. Do you recollect that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, so there were changing areas, some weeks different district council areas were higher than in other weeks, so it was moving about.
Lead 2C: Then on 21 September you might recollect that SAGE then considered whether or not on a UK-wide basis – or certainly considered the position on a UK-wide basis, didn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: About short circuit-breakers, is this the –
Lead 2C: Yes.
Baroness Arlene Foster: – the time that they talked about? Yes.
Lead 2C: So on 21 September SAGE had noted that incidence was increasing across the country in all age groups; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And that the effect of opening schools at that time had yet to be seen in the transmission rates; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, indeed.
Lead 2C: And it’s right, isn’t it, that SAGE proposed a menu of options that might be –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – open across the United Kingdom for meeting the situation as it then was; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, and I think the first of those was a short circuit-breaker, from memory, and then there were others of a lesser nature.
Lead 2C: That’s right, so advice to work from home, banning all contact within members of the household, so those kind of –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – those kind of restrictions.
That day, on 21 September, the health minister in fact he requested an emergency meeting of the Executive Committee, didn’t he?
Baroness Arlene Foster: He did.
Lead 2C: And the decision – or what he put to ministers was whether or not to extend the local restrictions on a Northern Ireland-wide basis; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: I think insofar as they were restrictions – they weren’t a form of lockdown, were they? It was just that certain sectors –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – weren’t permitted to open?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think that’s right, including close contact services and hospitality, from memory, as well.
Lead 2C: Well, I don’t think that – I’m not sure that’s right, because I think that on 23 September –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Right, okay.
Lead 2C: – pubs that didn’t serve food were starting to open in Northern Ireland, that previously having been –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Right. Okay. I can’t recall –
Lead 2C: No.
Baroness Arlene Foster: – the precise time, I just knew that we had moved to more restrictions on a – yes, that’s correct. So we hadn’t put in – we had put in the restrictions at a postcode level and then we followed those through right across the whole of Northern Ireland, and then later in October we had the circuit-breaker for four weeks, I think that’s correct.
Lead 2C: Yes, that’s right, I had really just wanted to set the scene, if I may, for, I think, the first document that it might assist us to look at.
Which is INQ000065631.
I think this paper might assist in understanding how decision-making had changed in Northern Ireland, Baroness Foster. I don’t know if you recollect it, but this kind of briefing was now coming before the Executive Committee in order to help inform their decision-making.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, it had changed in terms of what – I think Robin still was recommending what he believed was the right way forward, it was later on that he brought a menu of options, but I think he’s still recommending at this point.
Lead 2C: I think if we, first of all, look at paragraph 2, this sets out the reason why he was bringing this before the committee; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So we can see that case numbers were going up, and we can see that in fact cases and hospital bed occupancy were increasing at a rate of 50% a week; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And I think, again, what this was reflecting was that the effect of two things was awaited, the opening of pubs and the return of children to school; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I think that if we go forward again in time.
And if we go, please, to INQ000304274, please.
This recorded a call with the CMO on 30 September and this is a call with you and the deputy First Minister.
And I think that if we go, please, to page 2, the CMO sets out that the “Rate of risk [was] deeply concerning”. And you can see that the CSA was setting out that:
“[The] rate [was] above 2 over the weekend.”
Yes?
Again, I think if we follow this paper down, we can see that, first of all, I think the deputy First Minister was suggest – or asking whether or not it was being suggested that there should be measures for two weeks; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I think if we followed this on down, the Chief Medical Officer was saying that the doubling time was nine days and that time was not on our side; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So that was the position on 30 September.
And I think again if we can just pick up the chronology, and I think it’s correct, Baroness Foster, just to put this in context, that I think that this is a period when the local restrictions are still on foot; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: They hadn’t fallen away.
If we could go, please, to INQ000304331.
This is now 7 October, and we can see that the Chief Scientific Officer was setting out that all of the indicators were getting worse:
“Cases in [Northern Ireland] [were the] highest in Europe for 14 day rates.”
He set out the position in respect of hospital admissions, and setting out that it was thought that wave 1 admissions would be exceeded within a few weeks. Correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: And I think he was saying – it may have come down – that medical services were in danger of being overwhelmed at that stage; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Yes. Setting out – thank you – that the death rate, I think, would go up in two to three weeks’ time.
And I think it’s also right, if we just follow this through to page 3, he set out where the R rate would be if schools were to open.
So, yes, we just see it on the fourth paragraph down. Yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So he was advising what the position would be if hospitality and schools were both open at the same time, I think; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that was his modelling paper. He was always very clear that modelling wasn’t a prediction, when pushed about his modelling, but the modelling had taken in more information certainly than we had at the beginning of the pandemic, and we had our own Northern Ireland modelling, my Lady, which we didn’t have at the beginning of the pandemic either, and we had a strategic information group. So that’s what that was all based on, yes.
Lead 2C: So do you accept, Baroness Foster, that by this stage there was a good deal more sophisticated advice available to you about the R rate and, for example, about how it would impact on hospital admissions?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do accept that that was the case, yes, my Lady, although at times when – and we will see this – when questions were asked about some of the granular details we weren’t able to get those answers, which I think was a frustration, particularly for some of my colleagues.
Lead 2C: If we could move to the next document in the piece, please.
It’s INQ000276520.
So I think this will be familiar to you, Baroness Foster.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: It’s a series of papers that were provided to the Executive Committee at around this time. Yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: What the CSA, it appears, was doing was again looking at the R rate. Again, we can see, at 4, considering the position in relation to schools.
And I think if we just again scroll down, please, to paragraph 12, I think he sets out that the doubling time was seven to eight days, again that the ceiling I think for hospital capacity would be reached within ten to 14 days; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And that cases in those over the age of 60 had more than doubled; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Correct.
Lead 2C: I think that if we follow this on down, he sets out the position in relation to hospitals.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: So he set out, if we were just to scroll down, he effectively set out, didn’t he, that there was already very considerable pressure on the hospital system? I think that this is the paper, I think it was said that hospital capacity, I think, was almost reaching 100% at this stage; is that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, certainly hospital capacity was an issue in the first wave of the pandemic, and was still an issue, very much so, in the second wave, I think probably more so, because we were dealing with the normal winter pressures as well. Our hospitals are always under pressure in the winter, but they certainly were severely under pressure at this time.
Lead 2C: Sorry, I think, forgive me, if we could just scroll back up again, I think I went past it, if we just … just slightly up again, please. Sorry.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: Yes, I had missed that on the table. So that table was the table that was setting out in-patients and admissions.
Sorry, if we go back down again, please.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: He was also setting out the position in relation to critical care beds as well.
So in this paper he was effectively setting out the pressures that were already on the system without Covid-19 patients, and he also sets out in this paper why that had ramifications for community care –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – as well. Then in relation to critical care beds, he also set out and explained the number of staff who it required in order to staff those beds, and the extent to which it removed staff from other hospital wards as well. Yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I do recall a challenge, I don’t know whether it was from me or somebody else, that: why have we not more hospital beds ready at this juncture? And the answer given was that 15 intensive care beds extra would mean 100 staff, and there just wasn’t the staff to deal with that sort of increase in beds. Because it was a frustration, I think, given that we knew we always had winter pressures, that there wasn’t more capacity in the system in this particular year.
Lead 2C: But, Baroness Foster, I think the point that was being made in this paper, and it’s set out in the paragraphs that follow, I won’t go through all of them, but what the CSA was setting out in this paper, wasn’t he, was that interventions were needed –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – because if there weren’t interventions hospitals wouldn’t be able to do the work they were doing at that time and were at capacity doing; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that is correct.
Lead 2C: So there wasn’t any spare capacity in the system, and therefore if the situation wasn’t addressed –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – then the impact would be on ordinary hospital beds and the care being provided for people who didn’t have Covid and who had other illnesses?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I think if we go, please, to the meeting of 8 October, at INQ000065756.
(Pause)
Lead 2C: I think that we can see that it’s set out the impact that the transmission rates until that date were having on hospital beds; do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: If we please just scroll down, I think we can see – and I won’t go to this, but I think that this was the point at which the chief scientific officer was accused, as it were, by one of the ministers of looking for a damaging approach, and it was being said that people weren’t listening to the committee not going where the problem exists and afraid to say what the problem was; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think that was right, yes.
Lead 2C: Was that a sort of veiled reference to the localities in which transmission rates were going up?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think it was wider than that. I think, my Lady, there was a concern that a lot of the transmission was happening at house parties, and that instead of looking at hospitality venues we should be concentrating on enforcement in house parties.
And I know that there was a reluctance from the police to intervene in the private sphere, and I understand that, but it was felt that there was a lot of drinking going on at home and house parties happening and that’s – was part of the problem that was occurring in terms of transmission in the community.
People had a sense of relief in the summer, and that was continuing, in terms of not complying with the newer restrictions and regulations. And part of that was fatigue, I’m sure. A lot of people didn’t feel that they were – my goodness, having to go back into lockdown again was not something that they considered. So I think there was a variety of reasons why that statement was made, not going to the source of the problem.
Lead 2C: It is right, though, that this particular minister then did make a public statement, didn’t he –
Baroness Arlene Foster: He did, yes.
Lead 2C: – within a fairly short period of time, saying in terms that transmission rates were considerably higher in Nationalist areas as compared to other areas; that’s correct, isn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That is correct, yes.
Lead 2C: As his leader, did you in any way seek to sanction him or stop him or speak to him about making those kinds of statements in public?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think, given what happened later on, you will see that Edwin is very much his own person in terms of his opinions. However, it’s not a view I shared, and he knew it was not a view I shared, and indeed it wasn’t a view shared by the other DUP ministers either.
Lead 2C: I’m going to move on, if I may, in this document to page 16.
And I think it’s just at the bottom of the page, Baroness Foster, we have the Chief Medical Officer setting out his advice, and we can see the refrain – the constant refrain, I think – that modelling wasn’t a prediction.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: He referred, I think, in his advice to direct and indirect deaths; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So he – I think that must have been a recognition in respect of the position in hospitals; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And that he was never more concerned than he was then; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think it was a reflection of Covid deaths and non-Covid deaths from not being able to access healthcare.
Lead 2C: Yes, but it was also a reflection on the fact that hospitals were at capacity in Northern Ireland –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – anyway, with people who had a range of illnesses other than Covid; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I think that after this – and again if we could pick up the chronology, please, at INQ000439242 – he explained that, in fact, the situation in Northern Ireland was more serious than it had been in March.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Did you accept at that time, Baroness Foster, that the situation had become very grave –
Baroness Arlene Foster: I did, yes.
Lead 2C: – in terms of the ability of hospitals in Northern Ireland to cope?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I did.
Lead 2C: And in terms of the transmission rates as well?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And it seems that the local restrictions that had been tried throughout September and up until 10 October may have had some impact, but they obviously weren’t able to bring down the R rate in a way that would be required to meet the situation or meet the risk that then existed?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I think that the restrictions that were put in place were something that would have helped the R number, but unfortunately people weren’t abiding by them in the same way as they had been in the first wave of the pandemic and, despite the fact that we were urging people to work with us and try to get the R number down, I think people were making their own decisions at this stage and, unfortunately, we reached the stage where we recognised that we would have to have a circuit-breaker.
Lead 2C: I’m just going to go to, I think, the last document that illustrates the position at around this time.
If we could go, please, to INQ000286275.
And again, it’s a meeting with you and the deputy First Minister.
If we could scroll down, please, to page 2, and I think we can see it being said that hospital numbers and ICU beds were increasing significantly, that the point had been reached when routine surgeries were being turned down, and that a very hard intervention was sought. Yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And in fact he was seeking a six-week lockdown, as he describes it there; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s what he was seeking, yes.
Lead 2C: And I think that if we went, if we scroll down, we can see that the Chief Medical Officer was saying that health services were ten days away from being overwhelmed.
That’s the penultimate paragraph on page 3. Thank you.
There’s reference there to the doubling rate. I think we can see your concern:
“… if we go [into] lockdown Businesses will close. Suicide and other health concerns will skyrocket.”
And then the CMO advising, in respect of that, that if Northern Ireland was a country it obviously remained the position “numbers and trajectory are the worst in Europe”, “but implementation by 16 October is required”. Yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Do you agree that his advice couldn’t really be clearer at that point as to what was needed?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, he was very clear.
Lead 2C: That it was a hard and, I think we’ve already seen from the health minister that, a lengthier period of time than I think had already been suggested, so I think at this point they’re advising in and around three to six weeks; that’s correct, isn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, the health minister and his team were looking for a six-week circuit-breaker. I think I and colleagues felt, given everything else that was going on, particularly with people’s livelihoods and their wellbeing, both physical and mental, that six weeks was a very long period of time and the discussion then came into being around whether we could find a compromise position, and we were able to find a compromise position around four weeks.
Lead 2C: Just before you get to that point, COBR met on 12 October –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – didn’t it? And Northern Ireland in fact was mentioned, because rates were – the rates were amongst the highest. I think the only other place was Liverpool, maybe?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think Derry and Strabane was the highest anywhere in the UK at that point.
Lead 2C: Yes, and I think that this was also the date when it was announced that there would be an economic package as well, so as to fund any restrictions that were going to be brought about at that time; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: Again, I don’t think that I need to take you to this, but a paper was put before the Executive Committee that set out that the data showed that rates were higher, significantly higher than in Wales, Scotland and England, and that the 14-day rate for Northern Ireland was the highest than any country in Europe, with the possible exception of the Czech Republic; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Again it was advised that there was a need for stronger intervention in Northern Ireland than in other countries; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And in fact in this paper, the CMO and the CSA recommended a circuit-breaker to commence as soon as possible and lasting three to six weeks, so they in fact gave a window, didn’t they?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: In terms, then, of what the Executive Committee decided to do, I think it’s right that the agreement was to close schools for a two-week period?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think that’s right. SAGE, at a UK level, had indicated that schools could stay open, and in fact primary schools in particular had less transmission rates.
I think the Minister of Education, there was a week’s holiday, I think, coming up at half term in any event, and then he lengthened that by another week, so that was the two weeks that happened.
Lead 2C: Yes. So really one week’s additional school closures?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Then in terms of other restrictions, there were some restrictions around bubbling, so to be limited to a maximum of ten people.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Close contact services I think were to close, apart from those that were related to essential health?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: But, for example, gyms were allowed to remain open; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: This may be – if it assists, I’ve checked to make sure what was –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, yes.
Lead 2C: – brought in in that place, so I’m not trying to test you –
Baroness Arlene Foster: No.
Lead 2C: – but I have checked. But I think, perhaps most important of all, schools were to remain open once they came back from the half term break –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – and in fact the retail sector was also to stay open as well; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So although this is being described as a circuit-breaker, there were in fact aspects of society that were still open and available to people; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, but if I recall correctly, my Lady, there was quite strong messaging about not moving around and making sure that your travel was essential, even though we didn’t have regulation 5 at that point in place in terms of the travel exemptions, but I think we were trying to get people to stay at home as much as possible.
Lead 2C: So, that’s right, there was advice given at this time that you should work from home unless you’re unable to do so, and that no unnecessary travel should be undertaken; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: But that was advice as to opposed to anything –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – capable of enforcement.
Again, in terms of what happened in respect of that, it remained the position, didn’t it, that, as the weeks wore on, those restrictions did have an impact –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – but they still weren’t sufficient in order to meet the risks that still existed to the health service; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that was the advice we were being given, yes, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: In the paper that came before the Executive Committee on 9 November, in fact that continued to recommend that the closure of non-essential retail wasn’t required; do you recollect that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I don’t recollect that, but I’m content to take –
Lead 2C: I’m really happy to go to that –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – and to demonstrate that.
It’s INQ000065589. I think it’s at paragraph 25 on page 6.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So that was not being recommended, for the meeting of 9 November.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And nor was it being recommended, for example, that schools should close either –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: I think that the headline is that the Executive Committee was advised that the restrictions should be extended for a further two weeks; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct, yes.
Lead 2C: If we please just go to the final document in respect – before 9 November, and this is INQ000276538.
So the CSA was asked to model various contingencies or options open to the Executive Committee. So we can see the first one relates to services such as hairdressers, and he was asked to model that in line with, for example, if pubs and bars stayed open; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: I think if we follow this on down, he sets out that it’s just not possible to do that sort of modelling; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And, I think, the best, I’m paraphrasing, that he could do was to try and treat that as a package in order to try to, I think, inform your debate –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: If we go over the page, please, I think he sets out that under all of the scenarios that he had been asked to consider, that further intervention to prevent hospital capacity from being overwhelmed would be required at some point between 1 and 15 December.
Again, if we just look at the point he makes at paragraph 9 as well.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Hospital capacity is currently near 100% and has been exceeded on a number of recent days. It would only be possible to deal with an increased number of Covid admissions by downturning other services. This might lead to a greater number of deaths which is difficult to model with any confidence.
Yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Baroness Foster, that was the position going into the meeting of 9 November – correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: – for your Executive Committee to consider whether or not to extend the restrictions by two weeks.
When he gave evidence, Mr Poots said, I think, that it was – the committee of your group of ministers had met beforehand and that it was you who gave the lead that if there was to be a vote on the recommendation – and I assume he’s talking about the two-week recommendation – that it was you who was giving the lead that the veto, as he described it in evidence, should be used.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, first of all, that meeting that he’s referring to took place before 10 November, not 9 November. The context of 9 November is important, as with all things. Again, the deputy First Minister had indicated on the politics show on the Sunday that we can’t live in continual cycles of lockdown. She had indicated to me that she recognised low paid workers in the close contact sector, like myself probably, had been lobbied by constituents about the issue, and a lot of young women in particular were finding it very difficult because of not having any pay if they didn’t work.
So she’d indicated to me that she was willing to look at the close contact sector. That changed during the course of 9 November, and it became clear that Sinn Féin were not going to support that, and in fact we were going to roll on the restrictions for two more weeks without any recognition of the harms that were being effected against people in society.
So on the – before we came back on the 10th, we decided if they were going to push this instead of looking for consensus, because deputy First Minister was in the chair, so she had the authority and the agency, if you want to use that word, to ask for a vote as opposed to trying to find consensus. I was aware of that, and I felt it was a key decision and therefore should be recorded on a cross-community basis.
Lead 2C: Can I just check that I understand this, could we go, please, to INQ000356174, and it’s page 53.
This is redacted, but I think – sorry, I think we need to go slightly further up. Oh, yes, sorry, it’s there.
We can see that on 9 November at 6.24 Edwin called for a cross-community vote if needed.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: That’s you, isn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: It is, yes.
Lead 2C: So during the course of that meeting you’re, it would appear, getting someone else, Mr Poots, to call for the cross-community vote for you?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes. It’s not the convention for either the First Minister or deputy First Minister to call for a cross-community vote, so that’s why another minister would call for it. And that is actually towards the end of the meeting, because I think, if I’m right, from memory, Diane had to go to do something in the Chamber, in the Assembly, so I think that was coming towards the end of the meeting.
Lead 2C: Yes. So there’s no doubt, then, I think, Baroness Foster, that you were the instigator or the leader, as it were, of the use of the cross-community vote –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that’s correct.
Lead 2C: – at this meeting?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And in terms of the position that other ministers had taken, there is no doubt, is there, that the advice coming from the CMO and the CSA was quite clear, as we’ve seen, that health services in Northern Ireland were already under very considerable pressure?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, but we had also taken the decision that we were going to balance the other needs and, indeed, we had set up an enforcement group, which was then called an adherence group, I think, because we felt there wasn’t enough enforcement of the regulations that were already in place, and that was backed up by the Chief Medical Officer as well.
So we felt there was another way to deal with this issue rather than put more restrictions, particularly on low paid workers who were trying to find a way through what was a very difficult period for them.
Lead 2C: The CMO was quite clear in his advice, wasn’t he, that a two-week circuit-breaker was needed?
Baroness Arlene Foster: He was clear in his advice, yes, but, as I indicated, we had set up a mechanism whereby we wouldn’t just look at the health advice, we would take into consideration other issues as well, and that’s what we were trying to do.
Lead 2C: Had the position not become too pressing, given the level, the capacity or the lack of capacity that had been left in health services, for that kind of measure to be tested?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, the actual advice we were given in terms of the close contact services was that it would cause 0.05 to R, which we considered to be small enough on one side to allow people to go back to work on the other side, in other words that the benefit was better for those people to be able to work during what turned out to be one week as a compromise in the end of the day.
Lead 2C: And why, given the critical position that had been reached at this time, why press this matter to a cross-community vote, thus ensuring that you won the day?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Because we felt it was an important issue, it was a key issue, as defined by the Belfast Agreement, and that’s why it went to a cross-community vote.
Lead 2C: Even though it removed Minister Long from the vote and effectively meant that the true cross-community group of ministers, if I may describe them as that, because they represented each of the other parties –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, that’s the mechanism that we had –
Lead 2C: – couldn’t –
Baroness Arlene Foster: I mean, it’s a blunt tool, there’s no doubt about the fact that it is a blunt tool, and my Lady, it’s probably something that will be looked at in the future in terms of: do you move to weighted majorities as opposed to using the cross-community vote?
But it’s been there since the Belfast Agreement. It has, at times, been used by Sinn Féin, at times used by ourselves. It is a – it is the nature of the mandatory coalition here in Northern Ireland. And I know it’s difficult to look at it in the context of the rest of the UK, but that’s the way it is in terms of the mandatory coalition to allow those who feel that the decision is going against them, that they can call for a vote on a cross-community basis. And I regret that the vote was put, I think it would have been much better if we had have worked through it and tried to find a consensus way forward, which is what we eventually did, but in order to get to that place we had to use the cross-community mechanism, which is a blunt tool, I accept that.
Lead 2C: Do you accept that it sectarianised, effectively, the most pressing and critical of issues going to the health and the life of people in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I don’t accept that it sectarianises it, because it’s a mechanism that’s there, since 1998, for key decisions. I think it was a key decision for a lot of people in Northern Ireland that we were going to take their livelihoods away again. I think that if we had have been able to move towards a more consensus position – I wasn’t in the chair, deputy First Minister was in the chair, it was pushed to a vote, and we ended up in a position where relationships almost broke down, frankly, and then we had to take some time out, try to come back together again, trying to find a way forward. And it was very difficult to watch from the outside, I’m sure, it was torturous inside, and I hope that we never get to a place where we have a four-day meeting of the Executive again.
Lead 2C: You said that it didn’t sectarianise the issues, but by taking Minister Long out of the equation, it had that effect, didn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, it did, and I think that’s why I’ve said it is a blunt tool and therefore maybe weighted majorities is something that should be looked at, particularly with the way – the composition of the Northern Ireland Assembly now, now I’m not in it any more, but the composition has changed and therefore perhaps people would like to look at weighted majorities instead of cross-community vote mechanism.
Lead 2C: The mechanism was used twice over the course of that meeting, wasn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Lead 2C: And a number of people, and we saw what the CMO said about it, said that it didn’t just mark a low point in the pandemic, but that it marked a low point, I think in politics, in Northern Ireland generally. Do you accept that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, it was a low point in the pandemic, it was a low point – I mean, the lowest point for me was July, after the Bobby Storey funeral; this was another low point in terms of relationships. But the mechanism is there, it has been used in the past, as I’ve said, on other issues which are not constitutional, for Sinn Féin, such as welfare reform, so the mechanism has been used in the past, so whilst those who didn’t want the mechanism used will of course complain about it, it is there to be used by a minority no a situation where they feel they’re not being listened to in order to reach consensus and that’s what happened.
Lead 2C: At no point did you think “We’re in a minority here and we respect the views of our brother and sister ministers and it’s right and proper, given the seriousness of these issues, that we give way on this and see where we’re at in two weeks’ time”?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I really regret that we couldn’t find consensus and we were forced into that position. It certainly wasn’t a good look for the Executive, and I regret that it had to be used.
Lead 2C: Because all that damage, and I should ask you first: do you accept that damage was done to public confidence –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I do.
Lead 2C: – by the use of the vote? And that damage was done in order to achieve, I think, a one-week extension to the restrictions; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Correct. Which may not seem like much now, looking back, but at the time it was a huge relief for many working in those close contact sectors and in the coffee shop sector as well.
Lead 2C: But it was pointless, wasn’t it, because the advice that you had been given was that the two-week extension was needed, so that in order to try and avoid a restriction before Christmas, that was the advice that you were being given?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, in relation to close contacts, as I’ve indicated, that was indicated to be 0.05 in terms of R, and so we were trying to balance up that as opposed to the harm that was happening to people trying to make a living, and that’s why the decision was taken.
Lead 2C: In terms of what actually happened after that, it appears that there was a restriction, I think, for a week. The restrictions then lapsed from a period from 19 – it would appear, from 19 November onwards so that there was a week whenever non-essential retail and cafés were open; do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think that’s right.
Lead 2C: We’ve heard evidence that even that week contributed to a 25% increase in cases that was seen shortly thereafter.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, at the meeting of 19 November, from the minutes, the Department of Health had indicated that the death rate was lower in Northern Ireland than in other nations, and he did of course say that there was very little capacity for any surge at all. But at that stage we were looking towards a vaccine coming in December, and the hope was that R would continue to fall.
Lead 2C: Yes, I think that the point at which the 25% increases were seen was on 8 December.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: So there was a week whenever some services and non-essential retail were open, but in fact non-essential retail had always been opened –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – hadn’t it?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Schools had always been open?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: And it appears that it was cafés that had been re-opened in that week –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – where restrictions lapsed. Then it would appear –
Baroness Arlene Foster: And the reason why that was the case was that we had said we were closing for four weeks and a lot of the coffee shops had brought in stock to re-open on that week, and if we hadn’t allowed them to open for that week, all of that stock would have been lost, which is why we felt it was important that they should be allowed to open for that short period of time.
Lead 2C: Then I think that it’s right that after that week there’s then a two-week period of restrictions; correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think that’s right, yes, to 11 December, I think.
Lead 2C: Then – I confess it’s extremely difficult to follow this through, but there then came a period after around, I think, 13 December where those restrictions fell away so that retail was open again?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think that’s right.
Lead 2C: So do you accept that in this period leading up to Christmas, that the position that’s taken or the decisions reached resulted in a position that was almost incoherent in terms of restrictions being in place, lapsing, coming back in, lapsing, just before the Christmas holiday?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I don’t accept that they were incoherent, because we were communicating what was happening at that time, and people were waiting to hear, could they open their close contact hairdressers for a period of time – not just for the hairdressers, but frankly for a lot of ladies of a certain age who were feeling quite mentally unwell because they hadn’t had their hair cut.
And I mean, I know, my Lady, you may find that strange, but for those of us who need to get our hair cut every couple of weeks, it was becoming a real issue and we were being told this very keenly.
So hairdressers – 0.05 in terms of R – and the coffee shops were open for that week, and then they were closed again for the two weeks. The next couple of weeks was around allowing people to get ready for Christmas, to give them some hope, recognising that probably there would – restrictions would come after Christmas again.
Lead 2C: And I think the net position reached – and I think we can go to this at INQ000276571, and I think we can pick this up from paragraph 3 – that in fact, in terms of the modelling, that what it had estimated might happen in Northern Ireland was in fact borne out; yes?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes. They’re saying that the period before Christmas had led to that, yes.
Lead 2C: Yes, and that led to the highest rates of infection, didn’t it, in Northern Ireland during waves 1 and 2 of the pandemic?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, but I don’t recall, and I may be wrong about this, but I don’t recall the Department of Health asking for restrictions during those weeks before Christmas.
Lead 2C: Well, I’m focusing on what the Executive Committee did. We saw the advice that had been given –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, but that was –
Lead 2C: – leading up to –
Baroness Arlene Foster: – up until the end of November and then there was those two weeks that we were advised and we did that, those two weeks, to close down, and then we opened up again before Christmas. I don’t think there was any pressure to close before Christmas.
There was a discussion around Christmas, around – it started out, I think, across the UK, we were going to have five days for Christmas and then that was reduced to one day at Christmas to allow people to come together in a bubble of two households, I think, and that was reduced so that we would try and deal with those issues and then restrictions came in, as I understand it, on Boxing Day –
Lead 2C: That’s correct.
Baroness Arlene Foster: – at 8 pm, from memory.
Lead 2C: I think the point that the Chief Scientific Adviser was making when he came to give evidence was that what happened in Northern Ireland, that it had its highest death rates and highest infection rates, were as had been estimated and bore out what the Executive Committee had been advised of in the weeks leading up to Christmas.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, but I do make the point that we weren’t advised to close down before Christmas in those two weeks beforehand.
Lead 2C: And I think what we also saw, when we took the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland to this, was that in fact capacity within the health services were so affected by staff absences at this point in Northern Ireland that military aid had to be provided –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – to Northern Ireland in order to compensate for all of the healthcare staff who were off work?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: Baroness Foster, just one point: I think that it’s – it has been accepted by a number of ministers who have given evidence in the Inquiry, and I think you foreshadow it in your witness statement, that insufficient account was taken and insufficient account was paid to the most vulnerable people in Northern Ireland and what the impact of lockdowns –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Lead 2C: – would be on them. Do you accept that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, absolutely.
Ms Dobbin: My Lady, those are my questions. I understand my learned friends have some.
Lady Hallett: Would you prefer to have a break? We wouldn’t normally break until 3. You have got about 20 minutes or so of questions; are you happy to carry on?
The Witness: That’s fine, yes.
Lady Hallett: Ms Campbell.
Questions From Ms Campbell KC
Ms Campbell: Thank you, my Lady, and Baroness Foster.
Baroness Foster, can I take you back, please, to some evidence you gave at the start of your evidence this morning, and it’s in relation to the Department of Health being the lead department –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – in relation to the pandemic, and you’ll recall that section of your evidence with Ms Dobbin, the inference or perhaps the evidence being that in January or February 2020 you, as the First Minister, were not directly involved in the pandemic response in this jurisdiction.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Not involved directly in the pandemic response, I think that’s fair, yes.
Ms Campbell KC: Yes. So I assume, and you’ll correct me if I’m wrong, but I assume you have listened to the evidence of Minister Swann and First Minister Ms O’Neill.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Not all of it, but I’ve heard most of it, I would like to think.
Ms Campbell KC: Thank you. Well, it perhaps doesn’t matter greater but they were both asked about their recollection of Exercise Nimbus, which we know to be the UK Government’s exercise –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – in pandemic preparedness which took place on 12 February 2020.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: I think you may have been asked, at our request, to look at a few documents in –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – relation to that overnight.
Baroness Arlene Foster: I have.
Ms Campbell KC: I wonder if we can have a look at the first one, please.
It’s INQ000469510. If we can go to the second page, please, and just zoom in on the second page, thank you.
So we can see here that whoever has forwarded it from the permanent secretaries’ account in the TEO email account has indicated that this was not sent to the Department of Health minister, it’s to take place on 12 February at 4.45 in the evening, and we can see it’s a COBR meeting and it says underneath it:
“This is an invitation for your Secretary of State and First Ministers to attend a [top table] exercise on the coronavirus response.”
Okay? So the first point is that this wasn’t, if you like, an either/or Department of Health or First Ministers?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: You were, Ms O’Neill was and Mr Swann was –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – invited, and I daresay the invitation may have been extended further had there been such a request, but at the very basic level those were the invitations that were sent out, and you agree with that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: Now, we can see underneath what the nature of the exercise is. The aim is:
“To rehearse Ministerial-level decision making for UK pandemic preparedness and response within this novel coronavirus outbreak.”
The objectives are:
“1. To expose the potential scale and range of impacts arising [from] the pandemic …
“2. To identify the likely type and range of decisions that would need to be [taken] …”
And:
“3. To rehearse the structure, process and protocols for supporting critical, strategic decision making in response to [the approaching pandemic] …”
Okay?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Mm-hm.
Ms Campbell KC: Now, this was sent, if we can just zoom out, please, because I think this email is dated, at the top, 6 February, and we know that on 30 January a civil servant called Bernie Rooney had drafted that 30 January document that you’re not quite sure ever landed on your desk –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – but you’re familiar, broadly, with the contents of, and we also know that at the Executive meeting on 3 February Covid was on the agenda?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, under any other business, yes.
Ms Campbell KC: Yes.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: Did the terms of this invitation to you and the Department of Health and the Minister of Health not trigger your interest in terms of attending?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, there was a couple of things. First of all, the other devolved administrations were sending their health ministers to the event. Robin had led in COBR on these issues for us. And the third thing, which probably shouldn’t come into the decision-making but I think probably did come into the decision-making, was that we, as an Executive, were having an “away day”, in inverted commas, on 12 February to plan our programme of government and budget. In the minutes of the Executive meeting before 12 February Robin has said “I have to go to a COBR meeting in the late afternoon so I might have to leave the planning meeting early”, so he at that stage was committed to going to this meeting. So I’m sure that probably played a part in the decision-making as well, the fact that we had an away day planned for programme of government and budget preparation. And as I said, because he was leading on the issues for us with COBR at that time, I felt he was the most appropriate minister to go.
Ms Campbell KC: The away day was really to identify the most pressing issues for governance –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – with our new Assembly?
Baroness Arlene Foster: It was actually to try to see where we were going with our programme of government, yeah.
Ms Campbell KC: Yes, and it started at about 9 o’clock in the morning?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: And finished, we know, about 3.30?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: And in fact the Minister of Health dialled into this meeting –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – and you know that because you’ve seen it.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Mm.
Ms Campbell KC: So the away day in and of itself didn’t impact your attendance; you could have done both?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I could have done both but I didn’t know that at the time of the invitation coming in.
Ms Campbell KC: Well, it says 16.45.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, it says – for that, but we didn’t know how long the other meeting was going to run on for, which is why Minister Swann had said “Look, I might need the other meeting to go to this meeting” –
Ms Campbell KC: Did he need to leave?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, because he had – because the meeting had finished, no, he didn’t need to leave early.
Ms Campbell KC: Did you ask him at the end of the away day, “I understand you’re going to that COBR and it seems to be a significant one, would you please report back to me and tell me – and to us – and tell us what happened”?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, well, he did report back because he did update the Executive meeting at the next Executive, again under “Any other business”, around the COBR meeting and the planning of that time.
Ms Campbell KC: Well, you also mention that the other devolved administrations were sending their health ministers, the situation for the other devolved administrations is of course different, they don’t have the same departmental structure that you have to work with in this jurisdiction –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, that is correct.
Ms Campbell KC: – the Minister of Health having sole responsibility over his department?
Baroness Arlene Foster: That’s correct.
Ms Campbell KC: You see, if we can look, please, at the outcomes of the minutes of Exercise Nimbus.
It’s at INQ000195891, and if we can please go to, I think it’s paragraph 16, which we have to scroll down, perhaps to the second or third page. Thank you, fourth page.
At paragraph 16, if we can zoom in from 16 perhaps to 26 – or, well, this is fine for now.
The contribution, according to the minutes, from a Northern Irish perspective, and we can see it at 16 :
“NORTHERN IRELAND EXECUTIVE … highlighted they had a lag in available staff. As a result, community, social and primary care services were struggling. They had an eye on oxygen supplies as they [only – bearing in mind this is 12 February] had 4 days left but the logistical supply chain was a concern as all supplies came through the Republic of Ireland.”
Did you know that in mid-February, that there were only four days left of oxygen?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, but I do recall a meeting of the Executive a short time after that where it became public knowledge, and I think there had been a media report in Altnagelvin hospital. When we asked the minister about it he said no, that they had enough oxygen and they were content they had their supplies but I didn’t know about it at that juncture, no.
Ms Campbell KC: It would have been important, do you agree?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, it would have been important, yes.
Ms Campbell KC: We can see, following down the page here, that attending this meeting, from an English perspective at the very least –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – were the minister for Housing, Communities and Local Government, the Treasury, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Department for Transport, the Home Office, and essentially a wide range –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – of cabinet-level ministers or their representatives. Do you accept, looking at what took place and looking at who attended, that there plainly was a need for cross-government attendance at this meeting on 12 February, or at least it would have benefited had there been, from our perspective?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I think it’s fair to say, my Lady, that, looking at this now, both myself and the deputy First Minister should have been at this meeting along with the Department of Health.
Ms Campbell KC: You see, we saw from the email that I put on screen, and I won’t go back to it, that your, I think, permanent secretary replies that you’re keen for the Minister of Health to continue leading on this, or to attend on your behalf, and a short time thereafter there’s a reply saying the dFM is in agreement with you. Was there ever any discussion between you and the deputy First Minister about the potential importance of attending this?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No I don’t think there was any discussion around it. As I say, I had thought, wrongly, that this was a Health meeting. What happens ordinarily is that invitations are brought through the special advisers, who would say “This has come in”, they would say “I think Health should go to that”. And I’m not moving away from any – it was my decision to say that Health could look after it, but I’m trying to explain why I came to that decision, because they were leading on this issue at that point in time.
I fully accept that we should have been at that meeting and it would have been actually very helpful for us if we had have been at that meeting.
Ms Campbell KC: You see, this morning you told us about this period of time, that throughout it really you looked to the Department of Health for information.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: To use your words, this is not a passing of the buck, you just didn’t have the information?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: But is there an alternative way of looking at that, Baroness Foster, you didn’t have the information because you did pass the buck to the Department of Health?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No, I don’t think that’s a fair assessment of what was going on at that time. As I’ve said, we had other pressures. I fully accept that it turned out that this was the most pressing pressure and therefore we should have been at this meeting. I fully accept that. But at the time we had other issues that were pressing us for our attention, and that’s what happened I’m afraid, my Lady.
Ms Campbell KC: I’ll move on to a new topic and you touched on it briefly this afternoon.
Can we have your statement INQ000418976, at paragraph 233, please.
It’s your 28 February statement, Baroness Foster, and it’s dealing with the statement by your colleague Mr Poots in relation to transmission rates across different areas.
We might zoom in, please, on paragraph 233. You say:
“I am also aware that it has been suggested that a Minister indicated that rates of transmission were higher in nationalist areas as compared to unionist areas. While I don’t recognise this as being accurate, I don’t consider that it would have had a huge impact on public confidence.”
If we might just break that down, it’s not that you’re aware that it has been suggested; you knew at the time, in and around 19 October 2020, that your colleague had made a suggestion –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: – so it’s not a suggestion that you have realised after the event, you knew about it at the time; isn’t that right?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I didn’t –
Lady Hallett: I think, Ms Campbell, forgive me, I think you may have misread.
Ms Campbell: Have I?
Lady Hallett: Are you suggesting that Lady Foster was saying she didn’t recognise the suggestion that a minister had indicated higher transmission rates?
Ms Campbell: No, I’m suggesting that she knows as a fact that it did happen.
Lady Hallett: Oh, I see, as opposed to it’s been suggested?
Ms Campbell: It’s been suggested to –
Lady Hallett: I follow, thank you.
Ms Campbell: Yes.
So you knew as at – at the time, as a fact, that that statement –
Baroness Arlene Foster: At the time I certainly had no previous – I had no prior knowledge that –
Ms Campbell KC: No, I don’t suggest for a moment that you did. But you also knew – well, you’ve told us today it wasn’t a view that you shared?
Baroness Arlene Foster: No.
Ms Campbell KC: Insofar as you knew, it was an entirely baseless view; would you agree with that?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I do agree with that.
Ms Campbell KC: So we’ve got: the fact that it happened, the fact that you knew it was baseless, and it’s also a statement that was put out publicly at what was a very difficult time for our communities in the North because we were three days into this circuit-breaker. That was difficult for everyone across the board, you’ll agree with that, don’t you?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do, yes, absolutely.
Ms Campbell KC: Why did you not do anything about it publicly, given the importance to you, Baroness Foster, of maintaining public confidence?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Because I didn’t want to give it any more traction than it already had, and if I had have entered into the sphere to slap Edwin down for what was clearly not accurate, it would have become a huge media story, intra-DUP story, and frankly I thought it was better to let it pass and to – if I was – if I had have been asked about it, I would have said “Absolutely, I don’t agree with it”, but the reality is he’d made the statement and I was trying to minimise any impact that it had on public confidence.
Ms Campbell KC: Well, one can understand that, as a way of dealing with things publicly, is to not give it any further oxygen; another way of dealing with it is a public statement by you and the deputy First Minister, the then deputy First Minister, saying, “United we disapprove, we disavow that statement we are all in this together”. Was that an option?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I spent many hours trying to keep everybody in this together, including when the deputy First Minister went off and attacked other ministers, I tried to get everybody to keep it in the tent and work together. It was, my Lady, torturous at times to try to keep everybody on the same page. Because we’re all very strong personalities, I think the Inquiry has seen that from evidence that has been given, and I thought, perhaps wrongly, Ms Campbell, that that was the best way to deal with it, to try to not give it oxygen and to move on.
Ms Campbell KC: Did you consider that approach when dealing with the aftermath of the Bobby Storey funeral?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, the aftermath of the Bobby Storey funeral was in a completely different league in terms of –
Ms Campbell KC: I don’t suggest they were in the same league, but did you consider, in the aftermath of the Bobby Storey funeral, managing things publicly in a way that would minimise damage that would make sure the Bobby Storey funeral did not continue a trail or pass a trail over future decisions that the Executive had to make?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, actually, Ms Campbell, I could have and some people were pressing me to use the nuclear button at that point in terms of the Executive, and I felt that that was absolutely not the thing to do in the middle of a pandemic and that I had to stay and try to work through the difficulties that had arisen.
I know there are some in my community who were wondering why I hadn’t called for the deputy First Minister to resign, and I didn’t, at that time. I asked her to reflect and apologise, and I’m very glad that she has used the Inquiry as a place to apologise. I think that that is the right thing to do, and I’m pleased that that has happened. But be under no illusion, my Lady, that that was a moment of maximum risk, and I had to try to manage internally my own colleagues and externally as well.
Ms Campbell: My Lady, I appreciate I’m pushing time. I wonder if I can deal with one more topic.
Lady Hallett: One more topic, then we’ve got Mr Friedman.
Ms Campbell: Thank you, yes.
Lady Hallett: Because the stenographer’s going to walk out.
Ms Campbell: Yes, no, and I am grateful to our stenographer as well.
I want to, please, in that case Baroness Foster have a look, please, at some comments that you made in the middle of the discussions about the cross-community vote.
Baroness Arlene Foster: Sure.
Ms Campbell KC: It’s at INQ000116294.
This is a handwritten note of the meeting and it’s at page 95, and just while that’s coming up, when we were dealing with this earlier this morning you made clear that under the Ministerial Code there was a duty upon those present to try to reach consensus?
Baroness Arlene Foster: On the chair to try to reach consensus.
Ms Campbell KC: Well, and all of those present surely had a duty to try to assist her in that task?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, principally the chair needs to try to find ways to find consensus.
Ms Campbell KC: If we can, sorry, just go to the bottom of page 94 because it spans these two pages.
You can see that there is a note attributed to you, the First Minister, we can see at the very top of the page, and you talk about:
“[Executive] to reach consensus; vote …”
And then you talk about the Ministerial Code:
“… where have we breached?”
And then down the page:
“Only COVID deaths matter to [the] SDLP. All deaths matter to me.”
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Ms Campbell KC: Is that something that you might have said to Minister Mallon in a meeting where you were trying to reach consensus?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, well, I think you have to understand that Minister Mallon was essentially accusing me of causing deaths in the community at that point in time by not having a full lockdown, and I reject that completely, and I was concerned about all of the deaths that were occurring in Northern Ireland, particularly those deaths that were occurring because people weren’t able to access healthcare for physical ailments, or indeed for mental health ailments, as a result of restrictions that had been put in place not just in hospitals but also in general practitioners, and therefore I was making the point that all deaths that were occurring right across Northern Ireland were of concern to me.
Ms Campbell: My Lady, I’m out of time, unfortunately, but thank you.
Lady Hallett: Just a bit over.
Mr Friedman.
Questions From Mr Friedman KC
Mr Friedman: Baroness, good afternoon, I ask questions on behalf of Disability Action Northern Ireland.
Ms Dobbin has already asked you about your several reflections in your statement, that we needn’t go to, that in effect insufficient account was taken and insufficient account was paid –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Mr Friedman KC: – to socially vulnerable groups about the impact of the non-pharmaceutical interventions. On that, the Inquiry has heard similar insight from Karen Pearson, Jenny Pyper, Deirdre Hargey, Robin Swann and yesterday Michelle O’Neill that there was insufficient engagement with disabled groups during the pandemic in that respect. Do you agree with them?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes, I don’t think there was enough engagement, and I think that this is very much a learning point for any future emergencies, that we do engage immediately with those groups representative of vulnerable people, whether that’s people with special needs, whether it’s disabled people, those suffering from domestic violence, there’s a whole list of vulnerable groups that we didn’t engage with before the lockdown happened, and I regret that.
Mr Friedman KC: May I then ask you, as a previous First Minister, a person who knows this place, cares about it –
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Mr Friedman KC: – the same question that I asked the current First Minister: what is your lesson learned about why politicians in this jurisdiction who are otherwise deeply engaged in their communities have not been as equally engaged with disabled ones?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Well, I think we were engaged at a – because we don’t live separate from the communities, I’m sure you accept we live –
Mr Friedman KC: Yes.
Baroness Arlene Foster: – in the community –
Mr Friedman KC: Very much so.
Baroness Arlene Foster: – and therefore those of us who were close to people who had particular characteristics knew very well the impact that lockdown was having, and you will note that quite early on, and I was criticised for this, my Lady, I had a number of people coming to me and saying “We cannot access the graves of our loved ones, we cannot go to those graves because the gates are closed and you have banned us from going to graveyards. We can go out for a walk but we can’t go to our graveyards”. And I thought that was incredibly cruel, and we did react to that, and change that. And some people said “Well, why are you changing that?” But I was reflecting on the fact that those regulations should only stay in place for as long as necessary and if they were proportionate.
And again, if people brought us particular circumstances, and I accept that this is not a strategic way to act, I totally accept that, but if people brought us particular circumstances that were causing concern and harm, we would try to deal with that in the process. And I regret that we didn’t do enough at the start of the process to deal with those issues, but I think, as the deputy First Minister, now First Minister, said yesterday, it certainly is something that will be on the agenda moving forward.
Mr Friedman KC: So just lastly on that, there’s all the opportunity for that face-to-face interaction at the grassroots?
Baroness Arlene Foster: Yes.
Mr Friedman KC: But you’re accepting it needs to be more strategic –
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do.
Mr Friedman KC: – and it needs to be more structured engagement with organisations like Disability Action –
Baroness Arlene Foster: I do –
Mr Friedman KC: – is that correct?
Baroness Arlene Foster: I accept that.
Mr Friedman: Thank you, and thank you, my Lady.
Lady Hallett: Thank you very much, Mr Friedman.
Thank you very much for your help, Lady Foster. I do understand the burdens we place, as you’ve now helped the Inquiry twice as, of course, has the current First Minister, so I’m very grateful to you for your help.
The Witness: Thank you very much.
(The witness withdrew)
Lady Hallett: I shall return at 3.30.
(3.15 pm)
(A short break)
(3.30 pm)
Lady Hallett: I hope we haven’t kept you waiting too long, Mr Todd.
Mr Scott.
Mr Scott: My Lady, may we call Alan Todd.