openDemocracy has learned that Andrew Gilligan, the controversial journalist and Boris Johnsons’ former ‘cycling tsar’, has been negotiating with private sector pathology laboratories on behalf of the government.
His key role appears to directly contradict ministerial claims that the UK’s response to coronavirus is being guided – at all times – by science and expert medical advice. Labour’s Shadow Health Secretary, Jon Ashworth, is now calling on the government to “urgently update us on what their actual testing strategy is, and who is and who is not involved”.
With a chequered career as journalist, Gilligan’s appointment as Johnson’s ‘cycling tsar’ back in 2013 prompted accusations of cronyism. He is now a transport policy adviser to Johnson’s Downing street team.
Despite having no science or medical background, and holding a policy brief that has nothing to do with health, Gilligan has been holding discussions with leading commercial pathology laboratories as part of health secretary Matt Hancock’s promise to carry out 100,000 tests for coronavirus every day.
One lab executive, a scientist with a highly respected career in pathology, said he was shocked when he learned it was Gilligan who was calling him. He told openDemocracy: “I thought to myself at the time, what the f*** is Andrew Gilligan doing making this request on behalf on Number 10?”