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Home News

Meet the ‘naive’ & ‘ignorant’ Tory peer running govt’s testing programme

Some have questioned why the government didn't appoint an independent with expert medical knowledge.

Joe Mellor by Joe Mellor
2020-05-21 12:06
in News
Credit;PA

Credit;PA

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At yesterday’s PMQs the PM was asked by Rosie Duffield, a Labour MP, said that there needs to be a “change of tone” and “more female voices at the top of government”.

Why there are only a “handful” of women on the Sage committee of scientific advisers and only one female cabinet minister has given a Downing Street press conference?

The PM replied: “The honourable lady has an extremely important point, and I have taken action, even before a reshuffle. One reason we are making such progress on test and trace is that Dido Harding has come on board, and Kate Bingham is leading the national effort to co-ordinate our search for a vaccine with other countries.”

Recently Matt Hancock, also sung her praises, and announced the news that Harding will head up the cross-government Track, Test and Trace programme, saying that “he can’t think of anyone better than Dido” for the job. Is that so?

Hi, I'm Dido Harding, head of the Covid-19 Test and Trace program.

You may remember me from such films as 'That TalkTalk CEO Who Allowed Customer Data To Be Accessed By Actual Children' and 'Record-Breaking Fine From The Information Commissioner's Office'. https://t.co/vl042JtLd9

— Thomas Newton (@Thomas_Newton) May 8, 2020

Baroness Harding of Winscombe is chairwoman of NHS Improvement and former chief executive of Talk Talk. Just to clear something up she is Daughter of Lord Harding, Granddaughter of Baron Harding, Studied with David Cameron and is Married John Penrose, Tory MP for Weston-super-Mare.

While Talk Talk CEO, there was a hack and 157,000 customers had their details stolen, including names, addresses, phone numbers and email addresses. The bank numbers and sort codes of nearly 16,000 people were also accessed by the hackers, as well as the obscured credit and debit card numbers of a further 28,000.

When she was CEO, TalkTalk experienced a cyber-attack exposing personal and bank details of four million customers.
City AM described her response as "naive".
Marketing ran a headline, "TalkTalk boss Dido Harding's utter ignorance is a lesson to us all".https://t.co/m58JG0xbHG

— Alan Ferrier (@alanferrier) May 7, 2020

Harding was forced to admit that not all customers’ data was encrypted, including some bank details. She also demonstrated an apparent lack of understanding about how the hack could have happened in early interviews, sparking the criticism that she was “naive” and even “ignorant”.

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City A.M. described her responses as “naive”, noting that early on when asked if the affected customer data was encrypted or not, she replied: “The awful truth is that I don’t know”. Her “inflexible line” on termination fees was also criticised.

Marketing ran a headline, “TalkTalk boss Dido Harding’s utter ignorance is a lesson to us all”. The Evening Standard noted that “It has been a tough week for TalkTalk boss Dido Harding, facing complaints from customers and calls for her head.”

Eventually the company admitted the hack had cost it £60 million and lost it 95,000 customers. 

Some have questioned why the government didn’t appoint an independent with expert medical knowledge.

I do hope it isn’t the political appt it looks like.We need to be able to trust Track and Trace. It’s hard with Hancocks track record.

— youguess (@howhasitcome) May 8, 2020

Additionally Harding is also a board member of the Jockey Club, and surely must take some responsibility for giving the green light to the Cheltenham Festival from 10-13 March, which has been linked to a spike to coronavirus cases, just as the pandemic was becoming a serious problem in the UK.

So it is quite right that people want to know why a disgraced TalkTalk CEO is leading the government’s testing programme.

Related – PMQs – Johnson feigns ignorance as he lumps Starmer in with “experts”

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