MICHAEL Gove has denied he told select newspapers about Boris Johnson's second lockdown summit.
On Friday several titles reported that the Prime Minister will this week enforce another national lockdown in England to stem the second wave of coronavirus.
The Times reported that a press conference about this would be held on Monday following discussions of alarming new data with Chancellor Rishi Sunak, Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove and Health Secretary Matt Hancock.
The Daily Mail and The Telegraph released similar reports.
A hastily-arranged press conference then took place on Saturday amidst outrage that measures of such significance would be broken to selected media, rather than through a statement to parliament.
In a message to Tory MPs that was itself leaked to the media, Johnson insisted that the leak "was not a no10 briefing and indeed we have launched an inquiry to catch the culprit".
Now Gove has denied that he was the source of the leak.
Appearing on The Andrew Marr Show, Gove was asked directly if he had made the disclosure and replied: "No."
Asked if he knows who did leak it, he again said: "No."
And when asked if "we are going to find out who it was", a stuttering Gove laughed, adding: "The Prime Minister has put in place an enquiry which the Cabinet Secretary is overseeing."
Marr said the leak had "caused absolute mayhem in 24 hours". Gove responded: "No, no, again, we don't know how that information found itself in the hands of others.
"All I would say is that there are many meetings that governments have and that ministers have. In those meetings I think it is important that ministers can speak candidly, that advisers can speak fearlessly.
"I think it is vitally important that we do that and that is at the heart of confidence in government, so I regret the fact that this information was shared."
It is not the first time UK Government communications have been criticised over the pandemic.
In September, the Speaker of the House of Commons accused Hancock of "running this chamber ragged" by not giving Parliament details of changes in restrictions before the media.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle told MPs: "I accept that decisions have been taken in a fast-moving situation, but timings for statements are known to ministers."
Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove denies leaking to the press#Marr #Covid_19 https://t.co/9G2cXqOuSv pic.twitter.com/QWb7QbCgNG
— BBC Politics (@BBCPolitics) November 1, 2020
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