Former UK chancellor appointed as new health secretary

IANS | London

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Former British Chancellor of the Exchequer Sajid Javid has been appointed health secretary after the resignation of Matt Hancock on Saturday, Downing Street said.

Javid previously served as home secretary from 2018 to 2019 and then as chancellor of the exchequer until February last year, when he was succeeded by Rishi Sunak, the Xinhua news agency reported.

Hancock resigned Saturday after admitting that he broke the Covid-19 social distancing guidelines during an alleged affair with his aide, which reportedly caused an outrage in the country.

In his resignation letter to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Hancock said that "we owe it to people who have sacrificed so much in this pandemic to be honest when we have let them down as I have done by breaching the guidance."

"The last thing I would want is for my private life to distract attention from the single-minded focus that is leading us out of this crisis," he said.

Hancock also posted a video on his Twitter account, in which he said "those of us who make these rules have got to stick by them, and that's why I have got to resign."

Hancock has been under increasing pressure to quit after The Sun newspaper on Friday published pictures of him and his aid Gina Coladangelo kissing at the British Department of Health's London HQ reportedly during office hours in May.

Hancock's resignation came after embarrassing footage emerged of the health secretary in a clinch with his aide Coladangelo on May 6, when the public was still being advised not to hug people outside their household, a newspaper reported.