The Newsagents podcast is brought to you by HSBC UK, opening up a world of opportunity.

This is a global player original podcast. It is weird about COVID-19. And I've thought about this a lot,

that something which absolutely dominated our lives, day after day,

week after week, month after month, dominated every headline, dominated every single bit of our

existence in so many ways for so many of us. And this kind of happens a lot with pandemics.

We almost try and forget. It's receded so much from the public consciousness. But of course, for lots and lots of

people who had families who were affected, who died, who suffered, it hasn't gone away at all.

And the headlines today about the leaked WhatsApp messages in the Daily Telegraph, Matt Hancock, then the health secretary, of course,

his WhatsApp messages, particularly with regards to the situation at the time in care homes,

for all of those people and everyone else, it will have just dredged up that pain and that

toxin, really, from that time once again.

There are also some big journalistic ethic questions about how this has come into the public domain.

The journalist is a woman called Isabel Oakshot.

And I think that if you were a court reporter, you'd say, well, she's got previous.

Because there have been a number of occasions where she has done things that have sailed very close to the wind. And on the other side, you've got

Man Hancock. He of, I'm a celebrity. He of so many different things. I had a message from a

friend of mine who I think put it rather brilliantly. He said, Hancock versus Oakshot.

It's like Kissinger on the Iran-Iraq War.

It's a shame that one side has to win.

Welcome to the Newsagents.

The Newsagents.

It's John and it's Lewis and we and the rest of Westminster, I suppose, are looking forward if that's the right word or certainly reeling.

...