Covid-19 inquiry to examine Boris Johnson WhatsApp messages

Messages between Johnson and officials requested alongside cabinet minutes for second stage of inquiry

The Covid-19 public inquiry plans to scour some of Boris Johnson's WhatsApp messages as it seeks to identify any plainly wrongful decision-making and significant errors of judgment" by central government in the early stage of the pandemic, the lead counsel to the inquiry has said.

Opening the second stage of the statutory inquiry, examining how central government responded to the pandemic and made the key decisions that it did", Hugo Keith KC said it would ask whether late lockdowns cost lives and whether rule-breaking undermined public confidence.