The First Minister:

I express my condolences to every single member of the country who lost a loved one through Covid, including Pamela.

I make the point again to Anas Sarwar that all of us, including members of this Government, lost loved ones to Covid. I have ministerial colleagues who have relatives who continue to suffer the long-term effects of Covid. I have colleagues who had to restrict the numbers who could attend the funeral of a loved one. Many of us, myself included, had children who were impacted by the closure of schools, because of Covid. I say that not because I am trying to garner any sympathy from Anas Sarwar or anybody else, but because we were all in it together. We were not somehow detached from the impacts or the effects of the pandemic. That is why every decision that we made was made with one overarching priority in mind: how to protect as many people as we could from the harm of Covid.

Do I think that we got every decision right? No, I do not. I do not think that any Government or Government leader in the world could put their hand on their heart and say that they got every single decision right. What I can say is that we did it for the right reasons and that, when it comes to the big decisions that were crucial to saving lives, I believe that we got many of them right. Some, of course, we will not have got right.

I promise the families of those who have been bereaved by Covid that we will not only continue to co-operate with both inquiries, but learn the lessons of those inquiries.