4. What legal advice has the Counsel General provided to the Welsh Government about evidence given by Welsh Ministers to the UK COVID inquiry regarding deleted messages? OQ61319

Thank you for your question. A dedicated legal team, including barristers, are engaged to support the Welsh Government’s response to the UK COVID-19 public inquiry.

Thank you for that response. I would ask if any members of the Government have requested legal advice on deleted messages from you and also what advice has been provided about messages that were revealed publicly recently. My concerns relate to processes and the need to learn lessons. I've got to know a number of campaigners from the COVID families for justice who lost loved ones and, without doubt—and I'm sure you'd agree—we owe them answers. All of this is not about apportioning blame; it's about learning lessons for other public health crises in the future. Do you agree with me that the only way that we can find the truth about those lessons would be to have a Wales COVID inquiry, as the families themselves have campaigned for so tirelessly over a long period of time?

Well, the COVID inquiry is an extremely important inquiry into one of the most important incidents that have affected all our communities throughout the UK, and, of course, many internationally, and I very much support the work of it. I think those who watch those aspects of the inquiry will recognise that it has been a very effective inquiry. Just dealing with your latter point, the issue in terms of an all-Wales inquiry, I have always taken a view that the most effective way of doing it, of having an inquiry, would be to have a UK inquiry. If I thought that the alternative would have been better and more effective, then I would have supported that, but I do not see that it would, because of the way in which the various aspects of decision making and engagement were so dialectically engaged and interconnected, and also that the powers to a COVID inquiry at UK level are far greater than would have been available to a Wales-only inquiry. I do not think a Wales-only inquiry would have been capable of actually delivering the sorts of answers that I think the COVID inquiry is.

In terms of the other points you raised, can I just say also that, right at the commencement, before the inquiry started, the then First Minister was absolutely clear that there would be a maximum of disclosure and, in fact, a waiving—the first country to actually waive entitlement to privilege in documents, which, of course, the UK Government still actually retains, and, of course, on the basis that the inquiry is entitled to whatever information it considers is actually appropriate. So, the Welsh Government is fully co-operating with requests for information for the inquiry. We have disclosed WhatsApp and text message transcripts and screenshots. The Welsh Government will disclose any informal communication, and should any further information be requested it will be provided. The inquiry will review and determine whether the informal communications are relevant or not to the Welsh Government's response to COVID-19, but there is an absolute commitment that what the inquiry considers is necessary to have it will receive.