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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Matt Hancock affair

999 replies

TheoMeo · 25/06/2021 06:51

AIBU to be utterly peed off that another one of our Ministers - rather than devoting his time and effort to getting the country out of this mess - is busy carrying on with an aide (which he appointed at great expense to the tax payer) - aaaaaaag.
www.thesun.co.uk/

OP posts:
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6
WouldBeGood · 25/06/2021 07:54

Plus him pontificating on social distancing, and hands, face, space. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Douchebaggette · 25/06/2021 07:55

The OW has been close friends with him since uni - and was on the government payroll, having been appointed by him.

This isn't a private affair. This is a long running relationship (of some sort) culminating in her being appointed to a government posoiion she should never have been allowed anywhere near - because she is also a professional lobbyist. The public interest isn't that he has (presumably) been shagging her - it's that shagging her would appear to be one of the reasons she got such close government acess and money. Access/knowledge she then (presumably) sold onto her clients - directly or indirectly.

This government is shameful. Truly shameful. When you add up the lies and the money they've given to their mates, and the misconduct and the crime, it makes me popping mad.

Whichjab · 25/06/2021 07:56

@Bodgers

I came on here as soon as I saw the news to catch the hilarious commentary, and you haven’t disappointed MN.
Shame about the need for brain bleach
itsgettingwierd · 25/06/2021 07:56

Dominic Cummings needs to drive to Bernard Castle to test his eyesight.

Apparently it works well though as he seems to manage to watch Matt Hancock's every move and leak it to the press.

ancientgran · 25/06/2021 07:57

@ThePlantsitter

I don't see why having an affair should bring him down rather than being shit at his job, lying about being shit at his job, and loads of people doing as a result of his being shit at his job. But our country is fucked isn't it so I guess that's why.
He might have been better at his job if it had his full attention.
Moonme · 25/06/2021 07:57

@AbsolutelyPatsy unfortunately for MH it’s harder to deny when there’s visual evidence. Although he may do a Little Britain/Dominic Cumming Rose Garden and tell us we are all mistaken...

Pottedpalm · 25/06/2021 07:57

@pigeonpies

A man has an affair with someone he works with. Shock horror.

Seriously move on, really nothing to see here. It happens all day every day.

I'm not a fan of MH but an affair doesn't mean he can't concentrate on his job. Just like last year when I started a new relationship and everything was exciting and tense, i still managed to focus on my job, my home life, my kids etc. It's really not hard to separate the two.

If he's shit at his job, it's because he's the wrong guy.

I do feel sorry for his wife, but he's been criticised heavily in the press from day one, that must have been tough seeing your loved one ripped apart so publicly. Let's not reduce this down to a woman being shamed by her husband, times have moved on

I agree.
JeanClaudeVanDammit · 25/06/2021 07:58

I’d love to have enough free time to have an affair. Oh wait, I don’t, I’ve barely got time to wipe my own arse because of the impact of covid measures on my work and childcare arrangements.

DENNYCRANE · 25/06/2021 07:58

'Hands, face, arse'

Ipanemama · 25/06/2021 07:58

If Matt Hancock didn’t shag the woman he hired there would be nothing to leak would there. Abuse of public funds. I can’t see how he can survive this one.

Notonthestairs · 25/06/2021 07:58

Arms around care homes indeed.

He employed an old friend using tax payers money - and then either started or continued an affair. We are paying for them to spend time together.

Cam77 · 25/06/2021 07:58

Not defending his actions, but the fact that this CCTV footage from Whitehall office "got out".... When the powers that be decide that democratically elected person X needs to be removed (or kept out of power in the first place) then they're toast. Democracy provides little more than an illusion of power for the masses.

ChubbyLittleManInACampervan · 25/06/2021 07:59

Feel sorry for wife and kids, esp the kids Sad

What a plonker, a corrupt plonker it seems Angry

GappyValley · 25/06/2021 07:59

The stills from the footage look like someone has filmed the footage on a screen, rather than been taken from the original files

There will be plenty of people who are authorised to watch security footage. It doesn’t take much to get your phone out and record what is being shown on screen as a video, and then sending that video on

It certainly doesn’t mean anyone from the papers has been hacking into government systems

ballsdeep · 25/06/2021 07:59

I feel sorry his the partners involved.
Imagine waking up and seeing your wife/husband kissing like they were in a teenage disco 🤢

ancientgran · 25/06/2021 08:00

@TheoMeo

Oh FFS, does your sex life completely stop when you're dealing with shit at work But there are surely a lot of lies and secrecy with an affair. Surely that distracts you, also guilt.
Well I never conducted my sex life in the office when I supposed to be working, taking money for working.

I'm not sure why people assume it was Dominic Cummings releasing this, it might have been but it might be people in his department who are sick of picking up the slack when he and his love interest were busy with their sex lives.

Moonme · 25/06/2021 08:00

Morality matters and affects much of your personal AND work life, he is health sec, in charge during one of this countries most challenging periods, yet he finds time to pursue an affair.
He has spent his time thinking about getting in her pants rather than, in his own words "Saving lives"

Total agree but the man in charge of him has zero scruples, which the tabloid press have mainly ignored. We are being directed on who we should feel is morally wrong and who can get away with it because they are jolly, old Boris.

ancientgran · 25/06/2021 08:01

@Cam77

Not defending his actions, but the fact that this CCTV footage from Whitehall office "got out".... When the powers that be decide that democratically elected person X needs to be removed (or kept out of power in the first place) then they're toast. Democracy provides little more than an illusion of power for the masses.
I wonder if there is anything else on the footage that hasn't been released yet? This might be just the teaser.
DoingItMyself · 25/06/2021 08:02

I don't care who politicians shag, as long as it isn't me.

Backhills · 25/06/2021 08:02

I actually feel sorry for him here. It's not like he's the only one.

"Someone" clearly has it in for him, which makes me think he's probably someone who wouldn't toe the line and knowing what we know about the people policing the line, that's probably a good thing.

I don't think he's got everything right during the crisis, but I do think he's been facing an impossible situation and has genuinely tried to do it with compassion, at the same time as having those who should have been supporting him undermining him. I don't know who could have walked into that job knowing exactly what to do. Health Secretary was always going to be something you couldn't succeed at during this time.

EvenRosesHaveThorns · 25/06/2021 08:02

They are both married and it was well known gossip at his office. What a disgusting way to carry on in such a high profile circuit and how hurtful and horrible for the families and children involved.

Dustyboots · 25/06/2021 08:03

I can’t stand Matt Hancock. There’s something demonic about him. He’s got no soul and is as ruthless as a dictator IMO

I don’t believe this story is even true though.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 25/06/2021 08:04

He is married with children. She is married with children. Relationships break down, we all know that. But moving on to the next one before you've ended the last one is appalling behaviour. Having an affair which you hope to keep secret while you pretend all's well with your marriage is even worse. It shows you are a callous, dishonest person with poor self-control and you can't be trusted.

Boris Johnson has done, and therefore is, all of the above. He is in no position to criticise Hancock, never mind sack him on moral grounds.

If Cummings is behind this, it's quite clever, as it shows Matt Hancock in a very bad light, but even Johnson's biggest fan can surely not avoid seeing the parallels here. Cummings must surely know he will never be re-employed in government, and he seems to have decided to bring the whole pack of cards down with him.

The pretext for sacking Hancock now would have to be breach of Covid regulations. They got rid of Professor Neil Ferguson on those grounds. Was that Cummings' work too? Shows an established MO if so.

Of course, if the affair started before she was appointed to her post, that's an open and shut case and he should be sacked for that alone, but there again - remember Jennifer Arcuri? Johnson once again has already done similar.

I can't tell you how much it galls me, as someone who really ought to be voting Labour, that Her Majesty's Opposition is in such disarray that our current dishonest, incompetent, morally bankrupt government is seen as the less awful option and so seems set to remain in power for the foreseeable future. FGS, Labour, get your act together and re-connect with the electorate!

Cam77 · 25/06/2021 08:04

Zero sympathy but there have probably been a dozen other high level government officials who've done similar (or worse) the past decade who HAVENT been outed because the top tier of the British establishment viewed them as useful. I'm sure they've got something on pretty much all of them to keep them acting in their soecific best interests rather than that of the wider electorate.

Douchebaggette · 25/06/2021 08:04

Oh I think someone has it in for him, for sure. But if he is too stupid or too arrogant not to behave like this in front of a CCTV camera then he's better gone.

That and being a totally f*cking useless Health Secretary, of course.