Coronavirus: Welsh ministers back UK-wide inquiry into response

Coronavirus has been a huge challenge for all four governments of the UK

Welsh ministers have confirmed they agree an independent inquiry should be held into their handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

But Counsel General Jeremy Miles said it should be part of a probe into the response to the crisis across the UK.

Opposition parties had called for the inquiry to report before next May's Senedd election.

But Mr Miles said "we should not seek to predetermine" the timings of the inquiry now.

Welsh Conservative Senedd leader Paul Davies said the government's response means the inquiry is likely to be "watered down".

In a virtual Welsh Parliament debate, led by Mr Davies, he said ministers could be "held to account" by voters if the inquiry were to report before polling day.

Plaid Cymru and the Brexit Party wanted just an interim report by then, due to time constraints.

'Critical lessons learned'

Mr Davies said an independent judge-led inquiry should consider the "many questions" people had about how prepared Wales was for the pandemic, and the Welsh Government's "decisions and actions" in response to it.

"Even more importantly, it's absolutely critical that lessons are learned from the Covid-19 pandemic should this government, or future governments, be faced with a pandemic like this in the future."

On his call for the inquiry report to be published before the Senedd poll, Mr Davies said the people of Wales "have the right to be as informed as possible at the next election".

Paul Davies said the inquiry would be likely to be watered down

Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price suggested there could be a "phased approach" to the inquiry, with an interim report produced "before the end of this Senedd term".

The document would set out "the facts of what happened, how well prepared we were, who knew and did what in relation to the early response to the pandemic and what the interim conclusions are on what needs to be done differently in the future", Mr Price said.

The Brexit Party's David Rowlands said politics had raised "its ugly head" in some aspects of the handling of the crisis.

There was an "apparent desire in the devolved governments to assert their own authority".

They seemed at times to want to "exploit shortcomings of the UK government, rather than act uniformly across the nations".

It was "fundamentally important that there is a root and branch examination of why we were so poorly prepared for the pandemic," Mr Rowlands said.

Jeremy Miles was elected to the assembly in 2016 to represent Neath

Counsel General Jeremy Miles, the Welsh Government's top legal adviser, said the administration "does support the establishment of an independent public inquiry that could look at how we and others have responded to this pandemic".

But he said now was not the time to start setting one up, because "people who would give evidence to an inquiry are entirely focused on handling a current emergency".

The inquiry should "report and conclude at the times when it can most effectively undertake its task of investigation and scrutiny", Mr Miles said.

"We should not seek to predetermine when that can be today."

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He said Covid-19 had affected all parts of the UK and an inquiry should consider the handling of the pandemic by "the UK government, the devolved governments, and others".

"If not, then we would obviously accept an inquiry limited to events and actions in Wales," Mr Miles said.

He said the Welsh Government was not "opposed in principle" to the inquiry being led by a judge, as opposition parties have called for.

But Mr Miles said that would require "discussion with others", and that was a matter for consideration over the coming months.

In response, Paul Davies said: "The Welsh people will have an inquiry, but it is - disappointingly - likely to be watered down and weaker, which won't serve the needs of Wales."