REACT
I had a letter from three luminaries a couple of days ago:
I don't know about anyone else but I have quite a number of concerns about these surveys, so I have decided not to pursue the invitation. Instead, I have written to each of the three luminaries explaining why I will not be participating. My letters are as follows.
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2 Mitchell Green
Biggleswade
Bedfordshire
SG18 8GS
Ms. Kelly Beaver
MD, Public Affairs
Ipsos Mori
3 Thomas More Square
London
E1W 1YW
8 May 2021
Re: Invitation to participate in REACT survey
Dear Ms. Beaver
Thank you for the letter from you, Lord Bethell and Lord Darzi dated 4th May (copy enclosed) inviting me to participate in the REACT survey.
Much as I would like to assist the government obtain an honest, unbiased and fair picture of the spread of coronavirus, I am not prepared to participate in your survey, because I do not believe it will achieve this.
There are a number of reasons I hold this opinion. I am detailing those relating to Government and Imperial College in separate letters to those organisations; with regard to your involvement, my reason is as follows:
As an organisation Ispos Mori stands to benefit significantly from its involvement in the REACT survey and other work related to coronavirus. This survey is not like opinion polling for a general election, for which there is a defined ‘end date’ for the project. The longer your involvement in coronavirus-related work continues, the greater the benefit to Ipsos Mori; a declaration that the virus is not causing the issues that it once was, and is no longer likely to cause such issues, would not be in Ipsos Mori’s commercial interests. In essence, the longer you can drag this out, the greater the benefit to your company.
I am sure you will find another willing volunteer to take my place, although, quite frankly, I would prefer it if the government were to find ways of taking decisions that did not involve using taxpayers’ money to engage commercial organisations who may have conflicts of interest.
Yours faithfully
Phil Button
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2 Mitchell Green
Biggleswade
Bedfordshire
SG18 8GS
Professor the Lord Darzi
Imperial College
Exhibition Rd,
South Kensington,
London SW7 2BX
8 May 2021
Re: Invitation to participate in REACT survey
Dear Lord Darzi
Thank you for the letter from you, Lord Bethell and Kelly Beaver dated 4th May (copy enclosed) inviting me to participate in the REACT survey.
Much as I would like to assist the government obtain an honest, unbiased and fair picture of the spread of coronavirus, I am not prepared to participate in your survey, because I do not believe it will achieve this.
There are a number of reasons I hold this opinion. I am detailing those relating to Government and Ipsos Mori in separate letters to those organisations; with regard to your involvement, my reason is as follows:
- Imperial College is gaining significant publicity from its involvement in government coronavirus-related work. This publicity is surely tied to current and future financial benefits. The longer your involvement in coronavirus-related work continues, the greater the benefit to Imperial College; a declaration that the virus is not causing the issues that it once was, and is no longer likely to cause such issues, would not be in Imperial’s commercial interests. In essence, the longer you can drag this out, the greater the benefit to your organisation.
- The student population of Imperial College is reported to include a very significant number of students from the People’s Republic of China. Imperial is understood to benefit financially from their presence. It is widely rumoured that the Communist Party of China has significant influence over a number of such students, and it is possible that it exerts an undesirable degree of influence over the college itself. Chinese involvement in the origins of Covid-19 may be murky but it is unquestionable; it is surely possible that the CPC might seek to influence publicly released information relating to Covid through such influence within your organisation.
- As a statistics graduate (B. Sc. Hons at City University, 1979) who worked as a statistical consultant in the Central Electricity Generating Board in the 1980s, including generating reports for eventual government consumption on matters such as acid rain and the impact of the miners’ strike, I am far from impressed with the quality of information and modelling used by Prof. Ferguson and others. In particular, there has seemed to have been little by way of attempts to adjust models in response to actual, known data, and forecasts have been presented by Government, from (I believe) Imperial models, that are actually incorrect at the time of presentation and without context to facilitate interpretation. (That the presenter did not see that is, I believe, also a failure on the part of the specialists providing information to them). The Royal Statistical Society remarked upon these and other failures some time ago.
I am sure you will find another willing volunteer to take my place, although, quite frankly, I would prefer it if the government were to find ways of taking decisions that did not involve using taxpayers’ money to engage organisations who may have conflicts of interest.
Yours sincerely
Phil Button
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2 Mitchell Green
Biggleswade
Bedfordshire
SG18 8GS
The Lord Bethell of Romford
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State
Department of Health and Social Care
39 Victoria Street
London
SW1H 0EU
8 May 2021
Re: Invitation to participate in REACT survey
Dear Lord Bethell
Thank you for the letter from you, Kelly Beaver and Lord Darzi dated 4th May (copy enclosed) inviting me to participate in the REACT survey.
Much as I would like to assist the government obtain an honest, unbiased and fair picture of the spread of coronavirus, I am not prepared to participate in your survey, because I do not believe it will achieve this.
There are a number of reasons I hold this opinion. I am detailing those relating to Ipsos Mori and Imperial College in separate letters to those organisations; with regard to Government involvement, my reasons are as follows:
The Government has failed to properly consider the inaccuracy of models produced by SAGE, including many produced by Imperial College, whose predictions for fatalities in different nations worldwide have been significantly wide of the mark - especially for those that did not impose lockdowns;
The Government has failed to understand, and communicate to the public, that ‘the science’ being promoted by SAGE is but a set of theories and models, it is not fact;
The Government has failed to properly consider the political affiliations of many of its advisers, in SAGE and other bodies, at least one of whom is reported to be a member of the British Communist Party;
The Government has failed to properly impact assess non-pharmaceutical interventions, such as mask wearing and lockdowns, but has imposed them focussing solely on coronavirus, and ignoring problems that will arise as a consequence of the measures imposed;
The Government has failed to provide instruction to the public on the disposal of face masks, which are often seen discarded in the street. These items are non-biodegradable, and components of them will be causing pollution in the environment in decades, if not centuries, time;
The Government has contracted out research work to organisations - including Imperial College and Ipsos Mori - who seem to have an incentive to report a particular conclusion - that is, that the pandemic is not over, and that they must do more research for you in the future. In essence, the longer they can drag this all out, the more they benefit;
The Government has spent a huge amount of taxpayers’ money on such contracts, and on other Covid-related contracts (for PPE, for example) with minimal due diligence, and often to the seeming benefit of ministers, their advisers, families or friends, often to the benefit of countries (such as China) with whom we should arguably be careful about how we trade;
The Government has repeatedly published statistics relating to coronavirus without providing context - that is, it is not easy for the uninitiated to compare the number of deaths from Covid with, say, the number of deaths from cancer. This, I believe, has caused unnecessary fear and stress to many individuals (in 1968 the WIlson government went out of its way to avoid causing unnecessary fear in the public at the time of Hong Kong ‘flu, which, when the figures are adjusted for the increase in population, killed more or less as many as Covid has done);
Further to this last point, the Government has failed to communicate clearly to the public as to what they should do to optimally maintain their health. My own mother, aged 88, is an example; when told to ‘Stay Home’ she did exactly that. She didn’t set foot outside her front door between March and July last year, and, as a consequence, developed serious mobility issues; in February this year she was hospitalised, rehab was arranged, she was given exercises and discharged quickly, for there was a long queue of other elderly patients needing similar help. Government messaging should have stressed the importance of keeping fit;
Governments have repeatedly failed to ensure the NHS has capacity for more than optimistic levels of demand - even last year, little seems to have been done to prepare the NHS for a possible winter surge in 2020 / 2021;
The Government has failed to ensure that non-Covid NHS provision remains available during the pandemic. My partner has a number of health issues - some the subject of an ongoing legal claim so I am not able to go into detail - but was told last August by a consultant that she urgently needed a minor operation to prevent loss of sight in her right eye. The NHS was not able to provide this and we had to spend a significant sum of our savings on private treatment. Is this what was meant by ‘protecting the NHS’?
Through Ofcom, the Government has instructed broadcasters to not broadcast items that might discourage individuals from following Government instructions (as a result of which, I believe, a demonstration involving a rumoured 200,000 or more protesters, against the lockdown measures, went unreported on the BBC). If reporting is not objective, what is the point of having objective scientific research to support Government decisions?
Many years ago the UK government had access to scientific expertise in-house, or in the nationalised industries; with the vogue for privatisation these organisations were sold off, and, in many cases, the services of the scientists dispensed with. The UK is now beholden to foreign powers for expertise (witness the challenges of building a nuclear power station now, but at which we were experts forty years ago). Is it not time to consider how key scientific advice can be provided to the government without being at risk of being tainted by political or commercial interests?
Thank you for taking the time to read my letter. I am sure you will find another willing volunteer to take my place, although, quite frankly, I would prefer it if the government were to find ways of taking decisions that did not involve using taxpayers’ money to engage commercial organisations who may have conflicts of interest.
Yours sincerely
Phil Button
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