I mean, it’s not as though Sunak has anything to hide... Right?

This page being this page, as awkward and as contrarian as it sometimes is, the first thing I’d usually try and do to address the commentary on social media that speaks of ‘goverment cover-ups’ is by spending several days researching, writing and eventually publishing an article discussing why it isn’t a ‘cover-up’.  

However -

The problem I have in this instance - relating to the story of Rishi Sunak’s attempts to ‘cover up’ vital correspondence between former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, cabinet ministers and other decision-makers during the pandemic - is that there’s not really any other way to describe it. 

The government’s obfuscation, and attempts to block information - and their reasons for their attempts to block said information - are, for all intents and purposes, an attempt to ‘cover something up’.

As a result the only thing the government has achieved with any of this nonsense over the past week is that they’ve created the impression that they have something to hide.

The decision-making has been entirely political, too; there is no other [‘real’] motivation for the government doing it besides saving the reputation of those from the Johnson government that still operate within the Sunak government.

One of those legacy politicians from the Johnson cabinet is Rishi Sunak himself - and so this appears to be a story of self-preservation without anybody sane enough around Sunak to actually tell him that it’s self-immolation.