Humza Yousaf is “dizzy from his own spin” as he tries to justify his government’s “catastrophic mistakes” during the pandemic, Scottish Labour deputy leader Jackie Baillie has claimed in the wake of the ongoing row over deleted WhatsApp messages.
The row over the messages was sparked last week when Jamie Dawson KC into the pandemic, said “no messages” from within the Scottish Government had yet been provided to the UK COVID-19 inquiry.
The Daily Record subsequently revealed WhatsApp messages were manually deleted from former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon’s phone.
Documents submitted to the hearing also indicated messages had been similarly deleted from the device of Mr Humza, who succeeded Ms Sturgeon in the top job earlier this year, along with those of several other senior Scottish Government figures.
Speaking at Holyrood yesterday, Mr Humza, who has denied deleting any messages himself, defended predecessor Nicola Sturgeon, insisting she had offered “full accountability, full transparency” throughout the pandemic.
In the past, Mr Humza had said that the Scottish Government has a policy retaining WhatsApp messages, but later claimed the policy was to delete them, Ms Baillie pointed out.
She added: “Humza Yousaf must be getting dizzy from his own spin as he desperately attempts to defend the indefensible.
“The First Minister’s story is changing by the day and his muddled excuses are cold comfort to those seeking answers about the catastrophic mistakes his government made during the pandemic.
“Make no mistake, the SNP’s failure to properly comply with the inquiry is a shameful betrayal of the families who are seeking justice.”
She continued: “While the SNP scramble to cover their tracks, all those who lost loved ones and made sacrifices are robbed of their chance to get the truth.
“The same old SNP secrecy and cover-up won’t cut it – we need real transparency from this government and some straight answers from Humza Yousaf.”
During spiky exchanges in the Scottish Parliament, Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross said the “secretive approach” from the Scottish Government is treating families left bereaved by the virus “with contempt”, and hit out at an “auto-delete” policy he said had been introduced by the Scottish Government.
He claimed: “This is the digital equivalent of building a bonfire to torch the evidence.
“This week it was reported Nicola Sturgeon has deleted her WhatsApp messages.
“We know destroying or withholding evidence from an inquiry is illegal.
“Does Humza Yousaf accept that if Nicola Sturgeon or any Government minister has destroyed WhatsApp messages relevant to the inquiry, they would be breaking the law?”
Mr Yousaf replied: “In terms of accountability and transparency, Nicola Sturgeon stood up day after day, virtually every single day, did 250 media briefings, 70 parliamentary statements.”
He described that as “full accountability, full transparency” from Ms Sturgeon during the pandemic.
With the Scottish Government now in the process of handing over 14,000 WhatsApp messages to the inquiry, Mr Yousaf insisted his Government is “absolutely committed to being transparent, to being accountable”.
He added: “On top of those 14,000 messages, when I submit my final statement I will be handing over many messages, not just with Cabinet secretaries, not just with ministers, with UK Government ministers, with opposition politicians I communicated with across the chamber.
“I will be doing so unredacted, because this Government believes in accountability.”
Speaking to BBC Scotland News this week, Mr Humza added: “I have kept and retained all of the WhatsApp messages and I am more than happy to hand them over to the Covid inquiry.
“Government business isn’t routinely done over WhatsApp and of course where any decisions were made they were appropriately recorded within our message management system.
“If the Covid inquiry wants more information, needs more information, then I expect every minister, past and present, every government official or clinical adviser to comply.”
Express.co.uk has contacted the Scottish Government for comment.
