DoH aide intervenes to stop Norman Williams being questioned about health secretary Jeremy Hunt’s reluctance to go on television

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

Department of Health staff intervened to stop a Sky News journalist from asking one of its advisers why Jeremy Hunt was not giving interviews on the eve of the junior doctors’ strike.

Junior doctors' strike: Midlands hospital recalls medics - live Read more

Following requests from journalists for Hunt to talk about the strike, the department put forward Professor Sir Norman Williams for a pool interview with Sky correspondent Darren McCaffrey to be distributed to news outlets on Monday evening.

After asking where Hunt was, and being told by Williams that he was “at his desk” at the Department of Health, McCaffrey asked whether “it’s good that doctors on the eve of a strike and indeed the people that use the NHS aren’t able to hear from the secretary of state?”

Before Williams can answer, a Department of Health aide could be heard intervening to stop the line of questioning, saying: “Hang on a second, we’re not doing this nonsense like…”

He then says “we agreed a series of questions”, prompting McCaffery to respond that he hadn’t agreed to any line of questioning.

The exchange was later broadcast on the BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire show and then shared by junior doctors and others on Twitter.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest BBC report on the junior doctors’ strike

The Department of Health refused to comment on whether it was normal for aides to intervene to block reporters’ questions, but pointed to Hunt’s subsequent media appearances on the day of the strike itself.

McCaffrey wrote in a post on Sky’s website on Tuesday afternoon: “It was a reasonable enough question on the eve of the junior doctors strike ... although it appears the Department of Health didn’t feel quite the same way.”