Coronavirus in Scotland: Nicola Sturgeon declines to 'mark her own homework' over Covid mistakes

It will be up to a future public inquiry to pass judgement on the Scottish Government’s handling of the pandemic, Nicola Sturgeon said as she declined to “mark her own homework” at today’s Covid briefing.
Nicola Sturgeon said she had  tried to be "pretty candid"Nicola Sturgeon said she had  tried to be "pretty candid"
Nicola Sturgeon said she had tried to be "pretty candid"

Answering a question on the availability of PPE at the start of the crisis, the First Minister said: “It is right and proper for me to get questioned on did we make mistakes, did we get things wrong.

"I’ve tried to be pretty candid – we made mistakes in the early stage of the pandemic.

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"There are other things we got wrong that it’s probably less fair to describe as mistakes because we did what we thought was right based on what we knew.

"Right now, asking me what I think we got right and wrong, while legitimate, is almost inviting me to mark my own homework. I’ve got an opinion on whether certain criticisms of us are fair – and there are very fair criticisms, including problems with distribution of PPE at the outset; there are other criticisms I think are less fair – but that’s my view.

"Ultimately it will be for some independent process, a public inquiry, to look properly at where we got things right, where we got things wrong and where we need to learn lessons for the future.

"I can only give my opinion, but I’m obviously not the most objective person when commenting on this.

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“But we have genuinely tried to be frank about the things that didn’t go as well as we wanted them to and not to wait until a future point to learn lessons but to learn as we go.”

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