Matt Hancock broke equality rules over the way he appointed the Conservative peer Dido Harding as head of a new public health quango, the High Court ruled today.
The Runnymede Trust, an independent race equality think tank, won a High Court fight after complaining about Government appointments made during the pandemic.
Two judges ruled that Mr Hancock did not comply with a public sector equality duty during the process by which he appointed Conservative peer Baroness Dido Harding and Mike Coupe, a former colleague of Baroness Harding, to posts in 2020.
Lord Justice Singh and Mr Justice Swift granted a declaration to the Runnymede Trust today after considering arguments at a High Court hearing in December.
Judges concluded that Mr Hancock had not complied with ‘the public sector equality duty’ in relation to the decisions to appoint Baroness Harding as interim executive chairwoman of the National Institute for Health Protection (NIHP) in August 2020, and Mr Coupe as director of testing for NHS Test and Trace (NHSTT) in September 2020.
That’s twice that Hancock has been found guilty of “rule-breaking” during the pandemic.