Hancock resists calls to quit over ‘affair’ with aide

LONDON: Boris Johnson has rejected calls to sack Matt Hancock after the Health Secretary admitted breaching the Government’s rules on social distancing.

Hancock apologised after images emerged of him kissing a close aide who he appointed in his office at the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC).

Labour said that his position had become “hopelessly untenable” and called for him to be sacked if he was not prepared to not quit voluntarily.

However a Downing Street spokesman said that Johnson had accepted Hancock’s apology and “considers the matter closed”. Hancock said he was “very sorry” for letting people down after The Sun published a CCTV image of him kissing Gina Coladangelo.

The paper reported that the Health Secretary was having an extramarital affair with Ms Coladangelo, who he knew from their days together at Oxford University and who he appointed to the DHSC last year. She was initially taken on as an unpaid adviser on a six-month contract in March last year, before being appointed as a non-executive director at the department.

In a statement, Hancock said: “I accept that I breached the social distancing guidance in these circumstances, I have let people down and am very sorry,” he said. “I remain focused on working to get the country out of this pandemic, and would be grateful for privacy for my family on this personal matter.”

Labour Party chair Anneliese Dodds said if Hancock had been secretly having a relationship with an adviser he appointed to a taxpayer-funded role, it was “a blatant abuse of power and a clear conflict of interest”.

She said his admission that he had breached the rules on social distancing meant his position in office was no longer tenable. “He set the rules. He admits he broke them. He has cto go. If he won’t resign, the PM should sack him,” she said.

Despite Johnson’s determination to defend his minister, Labour insisted it would continue to pursue the matter and would not allow the Government simply to “cover it up”. “Matt Hancock appears to have been caught breaking the laws he created while having a secret relationship with an aide he appointed to a taxpayer-funded job,” a spokeswoman said.

“The Prime Minister recently described him as ‘useless’ – the fact that even now he still can’t sack him shows how spineless he is.” During a testy briefing for journalists at Westminster, a No 10 spokesman repeatedly stonewalled in the face of reporters’ question.

The spokesman insisted the “correct procedure” had been followed in relation Ms Coladangelo’s appointment but refused to go into detail or to say whether Hancock had declared their relationship to senior officials at the DHSC.

Pressed repeatedly on whether their breach of social distancing rules amounted to a breach of the law, the spokesman said: “I point you to the Health Secretary’s statement. I have nothing to add to that.”

The row carries echoes of the political storm which erupted last year when Johnson’s then top adviser Dominic Cummings made his infamous trip to Castle Barnard in County Durham in apparent breach of lockdown rules.

On that occasion, the Prime Minister resisted calls for Cummings to be sacked despite widespread public anger over his actions.

Johnson also rejected calls to fire Home Secretary Priti Patel when she was found to have bullied civil servants working for her, and he appears to be determined to do the same with Hancock.