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Grant Shapps has played down reports that the chief nursing officer for England has been unable or unwilling to take part in Downing Street press briefings because she would not defend Dominic Cummings.
The transport secretary told the Friday briefing that he expected Ruth May would be appearing again at future briefings.
“I don’t think it is true. She has attended them many times before. I notice that at the top of the No. 10 Twitter feed I see one of her tweets pinned,” he said.
“I am absolutely sure she has been a regular contributor before and I am sure she will be back here again.”
According to The Independent, May was supposed to appear alongside Matt Hancock at the press conference on June 1.
The newspaper reported an NHS source had told it May “refused to play along” with supporting Cummings – who was under intense pressure over allegations he broke the coronavirus lockdown.
At the briefing the health secretary was joined by just professor John Newton from Public Health England.
Boris Johnson stood by Cummings, who travelled from London to Durham during the lockdown because of concerns over who would look after his son if both he and his wife were incapacitated by coronavirus.
Durham Police concluded he may have committed a “minor breach” of the regulations by taking a trip to Barnard Castle but took no further action.
Jonathan Van-Tam, deputy chief medical officer, had told a No.10 press briefing the the rules must “apply to all”.
He has not appeared at one of the press conferences since.
England’s other deputy chief medical officer, Jenny Harries, echoed Van-Tam and said the lockdown rules were “for all of us”.
Chief medical officer professor Chris Whitty and chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallance have both refused to comment on Cummings’ actions.
A poll released earlier this month revealed a fifth of Britons are following the lockdown rules less strictly than before – with a third of those citing Cummings’ actions as a factor.
The YouGov survey suggested that the vast majority – some 73% – followed the lockdown rules last week as strictly as they had in the previous week.
But of the 21% who said they followed the rules less strictly, 32% mentioned Johnson’s senior adviser as one of the reasons for their breaches.
The poll suggested that in total 7% of Britons may have used Cummings’ actions as their justification for their own breaches of lockdown rules.