Covid review: What the witnesses said

Kate Brunner's report includes 1,800 pages of transcriptions from ministers, civil servants and others

This week has seen a 3,600 page report into government's response to the Covid pandemic published.

Kate Brunner's report includes 1,800 pages of transcriptions and written evidence from those who spoke to her team.

So just what did the senior civil servants and ministers who led the Island's response tell Ms Brunner?

Manx Radio has been looking at some of the submissions:

The decision to close the borders

Chief Minister Alfred Cannan was among those to speak to the review, looking at his current role but also his time as treasury minister during the pandemic. On government's decision to close the border to everyone, including Manx residents, he told the review: "I was very unhappy about that decision. I think that was a bad decision, very bad. And in fact, I didn't vote at Tynwald, I should’ve been sacked. I chose not to vote for that measure that came along with Chris Thomas. Actually, he should have been sacked that day, because he was in council as well."

Later, government decided to allow Islanders to return, if they quarantined at the Comis hotel at their expense - the review has recommended government refund these expenses. When asked his thoughts about the decision to use the hotel, Mr Cannan said: "Pretty outrageous. I would not really. I mean, we were forcing them to do something that in our mind, ultimately we were doing it on a national basis, forcing them to pay because they’d happened to be overseas or gone abroad or gone to the UK or something."

Former Glenfaba & Peel MHK Geoffrey Boot served as environment, food & agriculture minister during the outbreak, and also spoke out about some of the restrictions government put in place: "I don't think any country in the Western world anyway, should ever contemplate complete lockdown and removal of civil liberties in the way in which we acted during this pandemic crisis. I think it's wrong. I think depriving people of the right to return to their home as citizens of a country, things like that were not right. And also, boiling things right down, restricting families from visiting each other and intermingling was something I would never want to see ever again. We're going to see the social and economic fallout from this for many, many years."

The culture at the top of government

Several senior civil servants have left government since the start of the pandemic - a number of them due to their involvement in the behaviour that led to the unfair dismissal of the former Medical Director Dr Rosalind Ranson.

Among them was Director of Public Health Dr Henrietta Ewart. In May 2022, government announced she had retired, but in her evidence to the review she insists she was sacked, having been told her position had become untenable.

In her written submission, she said: "My treatment by my employer left me with symptoms of severe anxiety, depression and, initially, suicidal ideation. I have continued to find any mention of IoM or COVID ‘triggering’ as, indeed, I have found the experience of engaging with this review process." On the subject of staff burnout, she added: "I think this was real and prolonged certainly for PH, lab and CT staff. I don’t recall anything being done about this (either to prevent or mitigate) and I would say that, in my opinion, the ‘employers’ did not show any duty of care to us in this respect."

In her interview with Ms Brunner, Dr Ewart was asked about her interactions with ministers, where she said: "The ministers could actually be very unpleasant. And for myself, on one occasion one of the ministers didn't like what I'd written about something and told me to change it, and I told him I wouldn't because it was my professional view, and therefore I didn't think it was appropriate for him to tell me to change it. I said he could write his own version if he wanted, but I've given them my professional views and they've stood, and Will Greenhow very clearly supported me on that."

Dr Ranson became concerned about government's response to the outbreak, and whether her advice was reaching the top of government. One of those she spoke to about her concerns was the then-education minister Dr Alex Allinson, who was asked for his reaction to her concerns: "I became slightly more sceptical; I’d been questioning some of the advice being given to us by both the Director of Public Health and the CEO of the Department of Health and Social Care. And it wasn't just because of their input also, you know, I was getting conversations and communications from people working at Noble’s, from GPs as well, really quite concerned about various aspects of policy, whether that be provision of PPE to general practice right at the start, or in terms of liaison with some of the consultants at Noble’s. So, again, as Education Minister, I probably overstepped the mark in terms of talking to hospital consultants, but I'd been working with them for the last 15 years and they knew me and there was a degree of trust there. So I, on several occasions, went to meet with them just to factcheck what was going on and what we were being told as politicians was actually a true reflection of the extent of the issues that they were encountering."

Home Affairs Chief Officer Dan Davies, who was in the role of interim chief executive for the department at the start of the pandemic, also raised concerns about the culture at the top of government. He said: "I think there was a culture at Chief Officer group at that time where it was not seen as healthy, or particularly helpful to you as an individual to challenge. And I saw some pretty unhealthy behaviours at times, including somebody who did challenge being screamed at - literally screamed at -across the table and have a finger jabbed in their face and being told to shut it. And so, again, from a personal perspective, as well, my position was unclear because I was in an interim position, so I felt I was unable to challenge at that time. So I find it really difficult, and it was not a healthy environment between colleagues and peers."

Kathryn Magson's involvement

Throughout the Island's three lockdowns, the Department of Health and Social Care was headed up by interim CEO Kathryn Magson, who lives in the UK.

Manx Care Chief Executive Teresa Cope, who was appointed midway through the pandemic, gave evidence on her working relationship with Miss Magson. She said: "She worked very hard, she was working all the time. But being off-Island meant not understanding services and leading staff through this – balancing responding to Covid and ensuring other essential services were maintained – you need to listen to clinicians, take in views, understand health delivery and care. You need to be visible to staff for leadership. The idea of ‘work from home’ doesn’t really work in health and care environments, you need to walk the floor, engage with people and motivate them. People feel abandoned."

Miss Magson was joined at the DHSC by a health minister - David Ashford.

During his evidence session, he was questioned about the department's involvement in Abbotswood after 20 residents died as a result of an outbreak at the Ballasalla care home.

After the DHSC took over the operation of the home, the police were called in to investigate - no criminal charges were brought.

Ms Brunner asked Mr Ashford: "Did you know that the Chief Executive Officer of DHSC sent a letter to the Chief Constable requesting that the constabulary conduct a criminal investigation?"

Mr Ashford: "I found that out after the fact I found that out in 2021, I think. So I knew that being a referral to the police, but I didn't know where to actually come from, as my recollection."

Ms Brunner KC: "What's your view of the appropriateness of that?"

Mr Ashford: "I don't think it was for the CEO, to be perfectly frank, I think that was something that should have been really for the registration inspections team, because they are the are the power. Ultimately, if the registration inspections team felt it was criminal intent or criminal action that's been taken, then surely I would have thought would have been for them to meet with constabulary."

More on Abbotswood

A number of witnesses discussed Abbotswood - perhaps none more so than Zandra Preston, who was the manager at the facility at the start of the pandemic. She told the review: "When the criminal investigation took on, they asked me why I didn't move the particular gentleman out of the COVID wing. And I said, because if I put him into the adjacent wing, he would have just gone back to his room. And therefore, I didn't, because I knew, because he went visiting as well, usually to the wandering resident. And you would find him on other people's toilets as well. And he would just wander into a room and go into somebody else's toilet. And so I said there was no point because he was orientated to that room. Because they basically accused me of manslaughter, because I didn't move him. And I said, that's ridiculous. Because there was a door. It’s no different from a door from a side room to a door."

Former Chief Minister Howard Quayle was asked about government's intervention at the home: "We dealt with Abbotswood. We awaited a full report into it, which I never got to see. I know these things can take a year or two to see what happened. But from a Council of Ministers point of view, we've been advised that there's been a breakdown in procedures there. And it was totally infected now all the nursing homes and residential care didn’t have a problem. Well had a problem two had a problem later on. But that was through members of staff having COVID maybe infecting, this went horribly wrong. I haven't seen the report into what went wrong to cause it was there blame or not? I don't know because I haven't seen that. But I would like to place on record my thanks to the Health Service members of staff who went in and worked in that nursing home. Because we didn't know how serious the situation was."