Rees-Mogg calls Matt Hancock a ‘successful genius’
Jacob Rees-Mogg has defended Matt Hancock after he was apparently branded ‘totally f***ing hopeless’ by the prime minister.
The Commons leader paid tribute to his colleague the health secretary, who came under stinging attack yesterday.
He described him as ‘brilliant’ and ‘the one and only successful genius who has been running health over the last 15 months’.
It comes after Dominic Cummings leaked a text which he says is from Boris Johnson, in which the prime minister appears to describe Mr Hancock as ‘totally f***ing hopeless’.
In the exchange, Mr Cummings highlighted America’s success at raising the mass testing rate from 2,200 to 100,000 a day in two weeks last March. He says that the UK is stuck on 5,000-7,000 tests, with Hancock sceptical about getting to 10,000 by the following week.
To that, Boris Johnson replies: ‘Totally f***ing hopeless.’
In another exchange over Britain’s failure to buy ventilators because officials thought the price was too high, a message from the prime minister says: ‘It’s Hancock. He’s been hopeless.’
A month later Mr Johnson refers to the failure to procure enough PPE as a ‘disaster’, adding: ‘I can’t think of anything but taking Hancock off and putting Gove on.’
Mr Cummings shared screenshots of the messages in a 92-post thread on Twitter which linked to a 7,000 word diatribe about his time in No10.
He has hinted this is not the end of his attack, signing off his thread with a promise of ‘more to come’.
Downing Street did not deny the authenticity of the messages but has insisted the PM has full confidence in the health secretary.
Mr Hancock also backed himself yesterday, telling journalists he did not think he was useless.
Cummings’ latest bombshell claims come after he accused Mr Hancock of lying about testing patients who had been discharged into care homes from hospitals.
Tory MP Jeremy Hunt, who is the chairman of the joint parliamentary inquiry that heard seven hours of evidence from Mr Cummings earlier this month, said he had not backed up this key claim.
It is understood that the committee does not intend to call further witnesses to examine the allegation and is likely to conclude it has not been substantiated in a report due before the parliamentary recess next month.
The committee has yet to write its report, meaning Cummings has a couple of weeks to provide hard evidence that would change the conclusions.
Asked if the messages published by Dominic Cummings are genuine, the Prime Minister’s official spokesman said yesterday: ‘Our focus is not examining those specific images but delivering on the public’s priorities.
‘I don’t plan to get into the detail of what’s been published.’
Asked if the Prime Minister called Mr Hancock hopeless, the spokesman said: ‘I’m not planning to engage with every allegation put forward, the Prime Minister worked very closely with the health and care secretary throughout and continues to do so.’
Asked if Mr Johnson has full confidence in Mr Hancock, the spokesman said: ‘Yes.’
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