colonel richard kemp.ock — the former uk health secretary — has again appeared before the country's covid inquiry, which was set up to examine the uk's response to and impact of the covid—19 pandemic. he said that school closures could have been avoided injanuary 2021 if the government had acted more swiftly on spiralling covid cases. if we don't lock down, there will be more deaths, and we will have to have a tougher lockdown in the future. so on reflection and with hindsight, i think that if we'd taken action sooner — in september of 2020 — then we might, for instance, have avoided the need to close schools which, in the end, we had to because cases were so high byjanuary. 0ur political correspondent peter saull has more. the evidence began this morning, with a focus on autumn 2020, when there was a debate raging in government about whether or not a second covid lockdown was needed. matt hancock was pushing strongly for that at the time. he said today that had it happened sooner, then schools could have

live now to colonel richard kemp. he's a former commander of british forces.ruce play out for seven days and there had been concerns, hadn't there, about hamas getting a chance to regroup during that time, do you think seven days is sort of a long enough time for anything substantial to have been made for them to achieve anything substantial in terms of that regrouping? h0. them to achieve anything substantial in terms of that regrouping? ha. i in terms of that regrouping? no, i don't think— in terms of that regrouping? no, i don't think so. _ in terms of that regrouping? no, i don't think so. i _ in terms of that regrouping? no, i don't think so. i think— in terms of that regrouping? no, i don't think so. i think it _ in terms of that regrouping? iirr, i don't think so. i think it obviously is to their advantage that they pressed for the ceasefire themselves because they were severely weakened by the war so far. but there will be relatively little they can do. they have obviously redeployed many terrorist assets from the north down to the south and will have

uh, many, many thanks indeed to paul connew and richard kemp . after the break, richard kemp.ef patty slowly will gannon, chef patty slowly will be putting an african twist on some festive british classics. stay with us, please . stay with us, please. >> hello there. i am greg dewhurst and welcome to your latest gb news forecast. a windy picture as we go through christmas eve. some strong and gusty winds, bright in the north, damp in the south with some outbreaks of rain. courtesy of this low pressure. damaging gusts across gusts of winds possible across the the uk. 6070 miles the north of the uk. 6070 miles an hour. met office warnings in force. pressures force. further low pressures moving in for christmas day itself . so a bit of a north itself. so a bit of a north south split through christmas eve. spells, blustery eve. sunny spells, blustery showers half showers across the northern half of uk . wind gusts of 6070 of the uk. wind gusts of 6070 miles an hour. so do take care if travelling further south. cloudy across england and wales. outbreaks heavy across outbreaks of ra

yolande, i was asking richard kemp there about concerns relating to the civilian casualties in the gazaand his response was really that president biden condemning what he had described as indiscriminate killing of civilians was really to appease his political supporters in the united states and wasn't really supported by his actions. would you agree with that? i would say that there is global, international, there's international concern about the civilians who are being killed, it now stands more than 21,100, according to the hamas run health ministry, most of them women and children. those images are very shocking that we see on a daily basis of bodies being pulled from the rubble, including the bodies of small children. those images go out around the arab world in particular, where events in gaza are really being followed minute by minute, but also, of course, all around the world and cause so much horror. this is one of the most devastating military campaigns in recent history that there has been. and so i think that is something that we know that many of israel's close allies have

council spokesperson acts in most protective way of civilian casualties of any military in the world richard kemp but i hope that president biden was listening carefully today. when the so-called political head of hamas said we must engage in violent acts attacks -- against the united states and britain to force their hand to push for the cease-fire. they play into hamas's handle, this is part of their playbook from the start. attack with atrocities rape, torture, murder, mutilation and then push for a cease-fire, and blame the civilians lives blame civilian deaths whose live they don't care about. >> let me ask you this david shone when this biden blinken administration are basically rearming the enemy iran where donald trump this them on their back -- when we're giving money to a corrupt operation of the u.n. gives money to hamas -- when we are coddling qatar which gives money to hamas, and protects its leaders, when we give money to the pll in violation of the taylor act, who commit acts of terrorism as well. and when we give money or allow minnesota to flow into iran that funds hezbollah how

well, joining me now is former british army commander, colonel richard kemp, who has been very criticall kemp's always a pleasure to have you on the show . so ben wallace's comments , . so ben wallace's comments, what's your take on them ? what's your take on them? >> thank you. it's a it's a pleasure to join you as well. >> i think, um, ben wallace has made a pretty outspoken attack against the idf. >> uh, the way they're conducting the war in gaza in particular, he's accused them of, um, of disproportionate attacks of indiscriminate attacks of indiscriminate attacks of indiscriminate attacks of collective punishment i >> -- >> all of these things are very, very serious accusations, and none of them are true from my perspective anyway. >> and i don't think ben wallace has anything in his article that backsit has anything in his article that backs it up. >> i do believe, however , that >> i do believe, however, that okay, it's one thing to give a perhaps an unjustified insult to an ally in that way. >> he was the defence secretary . >> he was the defence secretary. he's no longer but hi