An advocacy group has sent a legal letter to the government body charged with protecting England’s public health, warning of a high court challenge unless it immediately publishes data of the spread in schools of the variant first detected in India.
The pre-action letter sent by advocacy group, the Citizens, working with AWO, a data rights firm, follows a report in the Observer that Public Health England (PHE) was preparing to publish the data on 13 May but the prime minister’s office intervened and put pressure on it not to do so.
The legal letter says the public health body is bound by law to be independent from political interference and warns it faces a judicial review unless it releases the data.
It cites PHE’s framework agreement with the Department of Health and Social Care that states it has “operational autonomy” and “shall be free to publish and speak on those issues which relate to the nation’s health and wellbeing in order to set out the professional, scientific and objective judgement of the evidence base”.
The health secretary, Matt Hancock, and Boris Johnson are both named as “interested parties” in the proposed claim, to which PHE has seven days to respond.
Clara Maguire, the executive director of the Citizens, said: ‘It defies belief that Public Health England is refusing to publish this vital public health data on the spread of the so-called Indian variant in schools despite scientists, teachers, parents and unions all saying that they need it to safeguard theirs and their children’s health.
“We believe that there is an immediate risk to life. The public needs this data now and we believe that PHE is acting unlawfully in withholding it. It is unbelievable that a matter of vital importance to our public health can be subject to political interference.”
The letter states that PHE had promised stakeholders that the data would be included in reports “on or around 12 May” and that PHE by not then publishing was in “breach of a legitimate expectation”.
On Thursday, eight unions wrote to the education secretary, Gavin Williamson, asking for the release of the same data.
