Johnson admits Covid rules went 'too far' for children

Boris Johnson has admitted that Covid rules probably went “too far” for children and that youngsters paid a “huge price” to protect others during the pandemic.

- ARCHIE MITCHELL MILLIE COOKE

Giving evidence at the Covid inquiry yesterday, the former prime minister said children could have been exempt from strict social distancing rules, which were put in place during lockdown to stem the spread of the virus.

Mr Johnson went on to insist shutting schools during the pandemic was a “nightmare idea” which he wanted to avoid at all costs and that he “had a personal horror” over the idea, fearing the impact of shuttered classrooms on the least well off.

He also admitted that the exam system put in place during the pandemic “let down a lot of kids”. It came after the former prime minister was shown a document drawn up by the Department for Education (DfE) in March 2020, warning that closures would mean almost 9 million pupils could not be guaranteed an education.

“I think that looking back on it all, the whole lockdowns, the intricacy of the rules, the rule of six, the complexity, particularly for children, I think we probably did go too far and it was far too elaborate,” Mr Johnson told the inquiry.

“Maybe we could have found a way of exempting children.”

He added: “It felt to me as though children who are not particularly vulnerable to Covid were paying a huge, huge price to protect the rest of society. And it was an awful, awful thing.

“As I said, I wish it had been otherwise. I wish we could have found another solution.”

During the evidence, the former prime minister told how he was left in a “homicidal” mood and wanted to sack his education secretary over the exam grading fiasco during the pandemic.

He admitted the system his government implemented to award exam grades to pupils who had not sat assessments “plainly let down a lot of kids”, after many children’s results during the pandemic did not reflect their abilities.