What began as a mysterious respiratory illness spreading through the city of Wuhan in China in December 2019 became a global health emergency by the end of January 2020.

As coronavirus began to spread rapidly across the globe, governments around the world scrambled to try to slow the rate of infection and contain the virus.

 

On 23 March 2020, then prime minister Boris Johnson announced a nationwide lockdown in the UK, ordering people to "stay at home".

More than three years later, at the centre of the COVID-19 inquiry are hundreds of documents, WhatsApp messages and thousands of bereaved families waiting for answers.

This inquiry is pretty much guaranteed not to be a fact-finding exercise – but a political one. It will most likely rebrand lockdown as a noble cause, led astray by a few faulty people. They, not the system, will be blamed.

 

In that way, it can buttress the moral case for future restrictions and the overriding power of an unelected civil service.

 

It won't be a way to genuinely clear the air, but a classic case of power absolving itself.