SAGE Membership - Guido Giveaway

The Government has moved to dispel public anxiety over the perceived web of secrecy surrounding the SAGE committee, which has heard, and discussed, scientific thought pertaining to the Coronavirus pandemic, by making public the names of its members. This rare and welcome moment of openness has, sadly, been overshadowed by the kind of fundamental stupidity to which those out on the right are far too susceptible.

Right-leaning media outlets approved, the Mail telling “The names of those who sit on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) had not previously been published on security and independence grounds. But this morning the Government bowed to mounting pressure and release then names of 50 experts across many fields who have sat in regular meetings during the pandemic - with just two refusing to be identified”.

For those out there not yet adding two plus two and getting four, they added “It came amid a row over No10 aide Dominic Cummings attending meetings and will fuel speculation that he is one of the two members whose identities remain redacted”. Speculation? It’s nailed on that Polecat Dom is one of the two, with the other name more than likely to be not unrelated to Cummings’ pal Ben Warner, so-called “Data Scientist”.

You don't get to know who this is, except he's in the other photo already

The belief that Cummings has precipitated an “Oh what a giveaway” moment was only reinforced by the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog trying to create a diversion by going after David King’s “Shadow SAGE” group, on the grounds that one of them had written something for the Fabian Society, more than one had opposed Brexit, and one was married to a Corbyn SpAd. The usual lame smears.

To then highlight the intellectual deficiency at the heart of the Fawkes massive, The Great Guido then tries once more to dissuade speculation about Cummings and Warner by publishing the SAGE membership alongside the sneering aside “Presumably just to set the conspiracy theorists off, two participants have not given permission to be named”.

But, to no surprise at all, the Fawkes rabble were putting no-one off the scent, with Paul Lewis, the Guardian’s head of investigations, noting “Curious why Dominic Cummings and Ben Warner are not on the list of Sage participants? Take note of the small–print. First, this is a list of participants who provided input ‘as experts’. Second, two participants ‘have not given permission to be named’”. To which he then added an aside.

“There's no doubt Cummings participated and gave input. Several other Sage participants have told us that. Seems the get-out-clause may be that he did not do so as an ‘expert’. Transparency, of course, is a relative concept”. Quite so. And that might have been that, had the Fawkes mob not made a last desperate intervention to divert attention.

“The revelation of SAGE’s membership has shown that not a single economist is sitting on the committee that appears to be advising continued economic lockdown. Not ideal The Adam Smith Institute are calling on the Government to listen to a broader range of experts when considering the process of winding down the lockdown” they blustered.

What does SAGE stand for, O Great Guido? Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies. So it’s got scientists on it. Diversion failed. We see you, Dominic Cummings.

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