GMB presenter praised for brilliantly holding minister to account over Indian variant

A Good Morning Britain presenter has been praised for holding a government minister to account for not acting fast enough to curb the Indian variant of coronavirus.

Speaking to the Minister for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Kwasi Kwarteng, Adil Ray refused to let him spin the government’s mistakes by talking about how successful vaccines have been and slammed him for allowing flights from India into the UK.

He said:

“It seems to me that you are finding excuses to try and justify why you made a catastrophic error with India rather than accept you made a mistake.

Your government tell us that 30 per cent of [people entering the UK from India] weren’t self-isolating. We know that there were 160 people at least that had the Indian variant. It was a mistake. Just accept that.”

And when Kwarteng attempted to wax lyrical about the vaccine, he added:

“We’re not talking about the vaccine I’m not going to let you do this, we’re talking about the Indian variant and the complete and utter catastrophic mistake this government has made.”

It comes as concerns about the variant grow, as it is spreading in areas of the country such as Bolton, and could be up to 50 per cent more transmissible than other variants of coronavirus.

The number of identified cases of the Indian variant in the UK has more than doubled in a week, from 520 to 1,313 and Boris Johnson has warned that this could endanger the UK’s roadmap out of lockdown - though it remains likely that vaccines work against it.

Reacting to Ray’s prowess in forcing Kwarteng to acknowledge the issue, people were quick to praise him and slam Kwarteng in equal measure for dodging the questions.

Peter Stefanovic, a lawyer and journalist said:

And Alistair Campbell said:

Other people on Twitter praised Ray:

More of Ray, please.