Boris Johnson took four days off as NHS warned Covid could ‘overwhelm’ system | Boris Johnson

Boris Johnson took four days off from official government business during a key period in the UK’s Covid preparation when the NHS was bracing to be “overwhelmed” by the virus.

Official disclosure for the period in February 2020 – described by the Covid inquiry as a “lost month” in the country’s crisis response – reveal Johnson enjoyed an extended break during the half-term holidays at Chevening, a governmental estate in Kent, where he spent time walking his dog and taking motorcycle rides.

The former prime minister was questioned on his activities between 14 and 24 February 2020 when he appeared at the inquiry in December 2023. He said: “There wasn’t a long holiday that I took. I was working throughout the period and the tempo did increase.”

But official activity logs appear to undermine evidence that Johnson gave under oath.

The files suggest that Johnson did not conduct any official government business on 15, 16, 17 and 21 February. Instead, he appears to have spent time walking his jack russell dog, Dilyn, in Chevening’s 1,416 hectare (3,500 acre) grounds, riding a motorbike given to him by his now wife, Carrie, and hosting friends and family for lunches, dinners and overnight stays.

Entries in the logs for 14 to 24 February make no reference to Johnson working on the Covid response, although he said he had discussed the virus on scheduled calls with other world leaders.

The Covid inquiry this week concluded that the UK’s response to the virus was “too little, too late” and the introduction of a lockdown just a week earlier on 16 March could have saved more than 20,000 lives.

It described February 2020 as a “lost month” and said the response to the virus was essentially halted during the half-term holidays. The report added that there was a “toxic and chaotic” culture in Downing Street under Johnson.

It found there were no cabinet meetings between 14 and 25 February. Johnson was not briefed “to any significant extent” on the virus during this period and received no daily updates, its report concluded.

It added: “Mr Johnson should have appreciated sooner that this was an emergency that required prime ministerial leadership to inject urgency into the response.”

The details of Johnson’s activities are revealed in an official government document contained in the Boris Files, a cache of leaked documents. The files have been seen by the Guardian after they were obtained by the transparency group Distributed Denial of Secrets.

On 21 February, as Johnson biked and walked around Chevening, the British government was briefed on a new cluster of 16 cases in northern Italy. Officials were told that seven patients were in intensive care and none had travelled to China, prompting fears that the virus could no longer be contained.

On the same day, NHS England noted that “even with continued mitigation work” it could become “overwhelmed” before the virus peaked unless the government made “significant interventions to flatten the curve” but lockdown measures were not implemented in England for more than four weeks.

Johnson was not briefed and the logs indicate he did not join any calls about the escalating situation in Europe. However, they show he enjoyed a four-hour dinner with Catherine Humphrey, a friend of his wife’s who would later be a witness at the couple’s wedding in May 2021.

The inquiry, chaired by retired judge and crossbench peer Heather Hallett, said the Italian outbreak “should have prompted urgent planning” in the UK, including by devolved administrations. However, its report added: “Instead, the governments did not take the pandemic seriously enough until it was too late. February 2020 was a lost month.”

The files indicate that Johnson carried out just two full days of work during his Chevening break, on 19 and 20 February. He held a 20 minute call with US president Donald Trump on 20 February, during which he said the virus and its origins were discussed. The logs say this was followed by a three-hour dinner with Henry Newman, Simone Finn and Josh Grimstone, former government officials understood to be close friends of his wife.

On 18 February, Johnson worked for just 40 minutes, joining a call with Chinese president Xi Jinping, the documents suggest. Johnson told the inquiry that one purpose of the call was to “compare notes” on Covid.

He missed a meeting of the Cobra emergency committee, which was convened to discuss Covid and was chaired by then health secretary, Matt Hancock.

While Johnson entertained his late mother, Charlotte Johnson, and his now mother-in-law, Josephine McAfee, over lunch at Chevening, the government’s chief medical officer Chris Whitty told the Cobra meeting it was possible the Covid outbreak could escalate to a global pandemic.

On 22 February, Johnson worked on his ministerial boxes for about 90 minutes before hosting family in his Downing Street flat and walking in St James’ Park as the Italian government prepared to put part of the country into lockdown after its first Covid death. Johnson then spent time shopping in Sevenoaks, before returning to Chevening.

He travelled back to Downing Street on 23 February, after spending several hours on ministerial boxes. By this point, the UK had 13 confirmed cases of Covid.

The government announced the first lockdown in England on 23 March. By this time, confirmed cases of the virus in the UK had reached 6,726 and there had been 336 deaths. Covid was listed on the death certificates of about 227,000 people between March 2020 and May 2023.

Joe Hurst, the spokesperson for the Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice UK, said the revelations in the Guardian are “horrific” and provide “further evidence that he [Johnson] wasn’t taking Covid seriously, that he was ignoring the warnings he was getting and putting himself ahead of the country at that time. It vindicates further the report that came out on Thursday.”

He added: “It sounds like he has questions to answer about how truthful he was in front of the inquiry.”

Hurst said the Guardian’s reporting was describing “gross misconduct in public office and a total abdication of his [Johnson’s] role and of his primary objective, as prime minister, of keeping people safe. That’s certainly how the families feel and that’s what the inquiry has said as well.

“It will be devastating for the families to read, and horrific. It further vindicates the reasons they were calling for the inquiry in the first place.”

Johnson declined to comment.

Additional reporting by Donna Ferguson