Journalist’s Bombshell Lockdown Files – Authoritarian Pandemic Governance Unravelling!
Be careful what you share on WhatsApp and never let Isabel Oakeshott in on a big secret if you don’t want it being leaked to the world.
So far, these appear to be the main learnings from the latest political scandal that is The Lockdown Files, a major expose of the government’s handling of the pandemic published by Oakeshott, a political journalist, in The Telegraph this week — or at least they probably are for Matt Hancock, who is quickly discovering the cold, hard reality of what it means to be thrown to the wolves by the woman he trusted to be his ghost-writer.
The extraordinary drip-feed of revelations dubbed #thelockdownfiles comprises of more than 100,000 WhatsApp messages — 2.3 million words — between then-health secretary Hancock and other ministers at the height of the pandemic in what is quickly becoming the biggest leak of data involving the Government since the 2009 MPs’ expenses scandal. Continues…
Editor writes…
Isabel argues that the official (Government) inquiry into the pandemic could take decades and we, the public, deserve to have this information now. Do you agree, or is there an important moral issue at stake here ? Is she, perhaps, causing scandal of one kind or another by publishing her exchange of messages with Matt Hancock, former Health Secretary? Are her critics right to accuse her of betraying his trust? Personally, I think “betraying trust” – i.e. exposing the truth – is what journalists are supposed to be all about. Your thoughts…
Comments (34)
What these politicians did shouting over one another demanding more and more Communist China style diktats, the Cons, Labour, SNP, Liberals and the Greens all clamouring to spread more hysteria and lock down us mere peasants. What they did to the sick, the lonely, the dying was pure evil. What they made happen around people’s funerals was pure evil.
These politicians need washed away at the elections. They have broken so many hearts, they could [not] care less. I see no repentance.
graeme taylor,
You are right – there is no repentance at all, although it’s good to see some MPs breaking ranks to say they agree with Isabel Oakeshott spilling the beans. That’s a good sign which I hope gathers steam in the days ahead. This is just beginning!
Fidelis,
Only a few MPs are breaking ranks, most are cowering out of sight. I was hoping that a lot more would speak up but not so far.
My advice to people, in work situations especially, is to put nothing in an email that you would not wish to see on the front page of the Daily Record. The same applies to all social media intercourse.
Do not say anything on the telephone that you would not wish broadcast. Telephone calls are recorded (mine were tapped by the State for a while) “for training and safety”.
You may get away with sending old fashioned letters, but I would not bet on it.
In general, there is a presumption of confidentiality in person to person communications. Conversations and emails were assumed to be one-to-one ad would go no further. This is an outdated etiquette. It is kind of based on an idea of “ownership”. Individuals “own” their information such as medical condition, personal relationships information, finances. These were all seen as being private.
Work information is in the same category and organisations expect their information, including internal exchanges between members to be kept confidential within the organisation. Most of those working in or for the government have to sign the Official Secrets Act.
If people find out things that they feel should be made public it is a serious matter to reveal information. It needs to be in the public interest. Criminal, negligent and illegal acts by public officials would come into that category. Has this lady betrayed a trust? Looks like it. Is she justified in doing so? I do not know. We do know that the Covid period was shambolic, badly run, corrupt, that vaccines are useless, that MPs fiddled money from the national purse, that politicians sent sick people into care homes and killed hundreds if not thousands. Is there more bad stuff?
Antione, all Ministers of the Crown are liable for government communications, these must be recorded and all Ministers are to be held accountable. That is the law, How it is enforced by the current senior civil servants and Ministers is very questionable. Ministers are allowed to communicate using whatsApp currently, as long as they ensure that these communications are then put on the record.
Ministers are public servants.
Antoine Bisset,
The answer to your question, is Isabel Oakeshott justified in exposing those WhatsApp messages will depend on whether you think a (hypothetical) journalist who exposed Hitler’s plans or any other evil plans, despite signing a confidentially agreement, would have been right to do so. I say there is a strong public interest, perhaps because I was one of those labelled a “conspiracy theorist” for saying I didn’t believe a word of the government’s claims about “the science” and the rest of the nonsense.
Personally, I think Oakeshott deserves an award for her exposure of the villain Hancock since by exposing him, she has shone a light on the rest of them. Sturgeon has been shown up for wanting to be “seen” to be doing something, which is what we all knew anyway.
I think it’s very clear. We were lied to by our leaders and those lies are being exposed. What’s not to like?
Josephine,
I agree that Oakeshott deserves an award for this expose. However, there is so much jealousy about her scoop that it will take time.
Antoine,
You ask if Isabel Oakeshott is justified in betraying her trust – I say, a tad ungrammatically, she is justified with bells on.
As she has explained, the Government inquiry (and there’s its first shortcoming – talk about putting the lunatics in charge of the asylum)… will take decades to publish its findings and I, for one, would not trust those findings one bit.
And about those vaccines – they’re not just “useless”; they’ve proved to be dangerous, leaving people with grave illnesses, amputated limbs (like the Glasgow man who appeared on GB News) and relatives lamenting the “sudden deaths” of family members.
No, if anyone is justified in breaking such a “professional” trust, it’s Isabel Oakeshott.
I hope, therefore, that you will reassess your “I do not know” [if Oakeshott is justified in handing over her evidence to The Telegraph]. If there’s one thing I DO know, it’s that she is, definitely, justified, as I say (again ungrammatically) with bells on!
They’re trying to pin it all on the revolting Hancock in order to let the others (Whitty, Valance, Johnson, Javid, etc.) off the hook. We need a Nuremberg style trial with life sentences for these people. They bankrupted the country and caused thousands of deaths and widespread health problems for what amounted to little more than the rebranded flu. They knew what they were doing. Moreover they’re not finished yet as the WHO Pandemic Treaty, Digital ID and CBDC’s attest.
Andrew, please do not forget Nicola, Keir, the Liberal leaders and the Greens, they all clamoured for more Chinese Communist tyrannical diktats. They all need to be answerable in a court of law for the last three years. What they did to people day after day was evil. Their “save us and save the NHS” propaganda is all becoming more and more exposed for the care less attitudes and values they clearly hold. No repentance from any current or former “leaders” of any of these political parties.
graeme taylor,
That is why the Scottish media won’t be reporting this bombshell news – they know they supported Sturgeon to the hilt and don’t want the egg all over their faces to be seen by a shocked public.
Andrew Q,
I agree about a Nuremberg type trial – absolutely.
The only true pandemic was a pandemic of malfeasance, ignorance, stupidity and corruption among politicians of all parties in this matter, and they do not deserve to be protected. I think Isabel Oakeshott should have spoken out, but I question her motives for only doing so now. Does she have a genuine desire to hold people to account for all the suffering they caused, or is this just a way to line her own pockets and boost her career?
Westminsterfly, I for one could care less about her motives. I thank God that Truth comes out like a beacon of piercing light and exposes these evil agendas and propaganda. More people are seeing the Truth.
graeme taylor,
I’m the same – I don’t care what her motives are, I’m only too glad to have the information and be vindicated. It was wearing being told the government had my best interests at heart and I must let go of these conspiracy theories, during covid. I can now say the same thing to the Isabel Oakeshott critics – stop being a conspiracy theorist, LOL!
WF,
To be fair, Isabel Oakeshott did make her views about lockdown known at the time. She was one of the few to try to put rational arguments against it. So few journalists did, that I have their names seared on my brain 😀
Not sure how you can have any sort of “trust” with a scoundrel, a liar and a fraud, but since the issue here is a crime against humanity, with which said scoundrel was fully on board, I support her actions fully.
RCA Victor,
So do I – if only we had more journalists willing to break ranks and risk the unpopularity with the government-sponsored media. That’s what was needed through out Covid and to be fair, Isabel Oakeshott did share her doubts about lockdown.
Margaret Mary,
I couldn’t agree more – that is exactly what we need, more journalists like Isabel Oakeshott. So far, it’s like a choir that can’t even work out how to do a descant, LOL! The same old, same old.
This stuff is popping up all over the place, LOL! This shows some of the infighting, led by Hancock. He is something else!
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/how-matt-hancock-plotted-to-have-useless-loudmouth-covid-scientist-sacked/ar-AA18dJzG?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=372efb41c0204d78b11d7c123291974a&ei=34
Margaret Mary,
Maybe all those Holy Face prayers about “putting division in the camp of Thine enemies” are working!
“I make no apology whatsoever for acting in the national interest: the worst betrayal of all would be to cover up these truths.”
Well done, Isabel.
Wurdesmythe,
That is exactly the truth. “Betraying journalistic ethics” is a joke. They don’t have any qualms about repeating propaganda, as they are doing right now with the Ukraine war and as they did all during Covid. They are hypocrites.
Here is Anna Brees, former BBC and ITV presenter who started her own channel when she opposed lockdown, masks etc.
Lily,
That’s a very revealing interview with Cathy Newman – she also made a mess of interviewing Jordan Peterson back in the day.
This is a very good interview with David Bull, who is a medical doctor himself, he is interviewing Isabel on his talktv show.
Isabel for Dame hood in the Coronation honours.
There is no “science” to force the elderly to die alone, these shameless charlatans Boris, Nicola, Keir, the Liberal part and the greens all need washed out of our Parliament at the elections. As more and more people are woken from their trusting sheepish slumber, it is not that far off now. Keep the exposes coming……….
graeme,
I agree – there is no science to justify the inhumanity of the tyranny under which we were forced to live during that Covid regime. And I’m hearing more and more people in public life saying they will never again obey, not from day one, of any similar “emergency”. Me, neither. Not that I kept the rules anyway but I’ll be more vocal about it if there is a next time. I’ll find a way to get my arrest into the news in case you’d like to bail me out 😀
Just as we knew at the time, the Government were conducting a campaign of fear to keep us under control. Brazen. This is in today’s Lockdown Files release…
https://dailysceptic.org/2023/03/05/matt-hancocks-plan-to-frighten-the-pants-off-everyone-about-covid/
I have popped in to ask if anyone reading this knows if the Scottish print and broadcasting media have reported Oakeshott’s Lockdown Files/Telegraph expose? I ask because out and about today, as is my wont when the sun shines, I saw several people wearing masks. I asked one of them if he knew anything about the Lockdown Files and the journalist who had exposed Matt Hancock’s deliberate fearmongering. He said “no” – and he clearly did not have the proverbial clue. So, not sure if that’s just him, so if anyone has seen any reports on either BBC Scotland or Scottish TV, please speak now or forever hold your peace 😀
Editor,
I seldom watch the mainstream Scottish news either but I doubt very much if this bombshell news will get a mention but if they mention it it will be the weakest examples they’ll give and denounce the journalist for betrayal of journalistic standards, LOL!
Further to my comment about the Scottish media not making anything of (or reporting at all about) the Lockdown Files, there are claims abroad that Ofcom which successfully saw GB News get rid of Mark Steyn, is now taking aim at Neil Oliver. A reader has just emailed me this video which shows the lie of Ofcom’s claim for the need for impartiality in broadcasting information about, e.g. vaccines… I’ve already written to warn GB News that if Neil Oliver follows Mark Steyn out of GB News, I won’t be tuning in again. That should worry them…
Great Post, Editor. Does anybody Ken the whereabouts of Darren Grimes? Haven’t seen him for ages.
Crofterlady,
I haven’t seen Darren Grimes for a good while on GB News but I found him on about the SNP leadership race, Yousaf in particular, so I’ll go and get that and post it on the SNP Leadership thread. It’s very good, he’s very outspoken in it.
Crofterlady,
Sorry – I don’t tend to follow Darren Grimes on GB News, but I took a quick look on YouTube just now and the most recent videos seem to be months ago.