NICOLA Sturgeon has indicated she wasn't singling out Boris Johnson when she blamed poor decision-making in the pandemic for lives lost.
The First Minister made the intervention today when she was pressed on her reference to the evidence of the Prime Minister's former chief aide Dominic Cummings to MPs last week about the "chaotic" nature of how the UK Government handled key moments in the crisis.
She told Holyrood last week: "As we know from bitter experience over this pandemic it is often the failure to take quick and firm decisions that leads to loss of life.
"And anybody who is in any doubt about that would only have to listen to a fraction of what Dominic Cummings outlined and what he described as the 'chaotic' response of the UK Government at key moments in the pandemic."
Her words were interpreted as an attack on the Prime Minister blaming him for the high number of deaths from the virus in the UK.
But speaking in Holyrood today, she told MSPs that she wasn't singling out a particular politician but making a wider point about the impact of slow decision making.
"The point I was making last week was not to point the finger at any politician but to make the general point that one of the lessons all of us [in decision making positions] should have learned over the past more than a year now is that taking quick decisions is really important and that applies to me just as much as it applies to anyone else," she said.
"We have sought to learn lessons as we go as our understanding and knowledge of this virus has developed and as we have candidly said we have perhaps made mistakes in how we did things in the early part of that."
Her comments were made in reply to a question from Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar who welcomed her response but who said that a key moments in the pandemic the Scottish and UK governments "were in lock step".
He said: "Let's look at some of those specific decisions. In early March both governments were talking about a strategy for herd immunity, on March 12 47,000 fans attended a European football match in Glasgow, that same day the Scottish Government said that stopping mass gatherings was not the best way to contain the virus .. .and Covid positive patients were being sent into care homes."
Sarwar went onto add that the UK Government went onto announce routine testing on April 15, the Scottish Government on April 21 and asked the First Minister whether these were decisions her government had made.
She said: "There is nothing I have sought to shy away from. I lived through that period as the lead decision maker in the Scottish Government, I take responsibility for all the decisions ... I will live with the consequences of those decisions for as long as I live and those decisions will be subject to serious scrutiny."
Why are you making commenting on The National only available to subscribers?
We know there are thousands of National readers who want to debate, argue and go back and forth in the comments section of our stories. We’ve got the most informed readers in Scotland, asking each other the big questions about the future of our country.
Unfortunately, though, these important debates are being spoiled by a vocal minority of trolls who aren’t really interested in the issues, try to derail the conversations, register under fake names, and post vile abuse.
So that’s why we’ve decided to make the ability to comment only available to our paying subscribers. That way, all the trolls who post abuse on our website will have to pay if they want to join the debate – and risk a permanent ban from the account that they subscribe with.
The conversation will go back to what it should be about – people who care passionately about the issues, but disagree constructively on what we should do about them. Let’s get that debate started!
Callum Baird, Editor of The National
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel