Inquiry to look at handling of Covid-19 in NI

The UK Covid-19 opens in Belfast today where it will hear several weeks of testimony.

It will look at decision making in Northern Ireland during the pandemic and how it contributed to the handling of the crisis.

Among those due to give evidence are representatives of bereaved families, health professionals, current and former senior civil servants, and Stormont politicians.

The inquiry is likely to examine tensions between the parties who made up the Stormont Executive at the time and whether it fed into Covid decision making.

The inquiry will sit for three weeks in Northern Ireland.

Among the areas it will cover are the Stormont government’s response to the emerging crisis.

That will include the initial reaction, subsequent decision making, and both the political and civil service performance.

There is also likely to be a considerable focus on rules around public gatherings and funerals.

There was an outcry in Northern Ireland when large crowds of republicans, including senior Sinn Féin politicians, attended the funeral of former IRA leader Bobby Storey.

The public prosecution service later decided not to bring any charges due to what it said was a lack of “clarity and coherence” within the regulations.

Former DUP agriculture minister Edwin Poots also caused controversy when he claimed there was a higher incidence of the infection in nationalist areas.

Arlene Foster and Michelle O’Neill, who were first and deputy first ministers at the time, are expected to give evidence in the weeks ahead.

Inquiry chair Heather Hallett met eight bereaved families in Belfast last night ahead of the proceedings.

One of the first groups she will hear from – Northern Ireland Covid Bereaved Families for Justice – represents around 150 families.

Brenda Doherty is a founding member.

Her 82-year-old mother Ruth Burke was the first woman to die of the infection in Northern Ireland.

Ms Doherty said she hoped it was important to have the inquiry in Belfast to look specifically at Northern Ireland’s experience.

She said that Northern Ireland had at times too closely followed UK rules when the circumstances were different and that there should have been greater cross border partnership to better tackle the pandemic.

Ms Doherty said: “Recommendations can’t sit on the shelf and gather dust, we’re always the last tram.

“So actually to have them here, to have the chair meet the families who are taking part in a listening exercise, because it’s our voices that need to be heard.”

She said her family was still dealing with the trauma of losing their mother during lockdown with all the restrictions that accompanied the death and funeral.

Ms Burke contracted the virus while in hospital and was the fourth person to die in Northern Ireland and the first woman.

“It was a closed coffin, we didn’t get to bring her home, we met her at the cemetery gates,” she said.

“My brothers and her grandsons still struggle with the fact that they didn’t get to carry her,” she added.

At the time, ten family members were allowed in the cemetery but only Ms Doherty and her sister were allowed at the graveside.

“I went to touch the coffin and I was told that I couldn’t touch it and I couldn’t be there til mummy was in a hole in the ground, so I didn’t even get to touch her coffin,” Ms Doherty said.

“And after that the cemetery gates were closed for three weeks and we weren’t allowed in until the restrictions at cemeteries were lifted,” she said.

“For us as a family, mummy dying without any of us there, we will never, ever get over that,” she added.

Ms Doherty said: “There’s a lot of guilt, and the families that we support I would say the guilt is not ours to carry, we were only following guidelines.

“But you still feel guilty and I don’t think my mummy would have understood why none of us were there.

“She was as sharp as a nail, but I think if someone was trying to explain to her that she had to die without any of us, she wouldn’t have been able to comprehend why that was.”