Former Children’s Commissioner Baroness Anne Longfield told the UK Covid-19 Inquiry that the government must formally apologize for "avoidable mistakes" that led to an "explosion in vulnerability" among children during the pandemic.
October 2, 2025
Source:
Children's Commissioner
Government Urged to Apologize for "Damaging" Covid Errors
The UK government owes children a formal apology for the “avoidable mistakes” and policy failures made during the Covid-19 pandemic, the former Children’s Commissioner for England, Baroness Anne Longfield, told the UK Covid-19 Inquiry on Thursday.
In her testimony, Baroness Longfield argued that prolonged lockdowns and "shambolic" school closures caused lasting harm to a generation of young people. She stated that children were consistently "overlooked and frequently ignored" in the government's response to the crisis.
A Call for Formal Recognition
Longfield urged the Prime Minister to issue a formal apology in Parliament once the inquiry concludes its findings. She described this as a necessary step to acknowledge the damage inflicted and to rebuild trust.
“It would be a very powerful signal to children that they are important and that the country has their best interests at heart,” she stated in her written evidence. The apology should serve as a promise to place children at the core of future emergency planning.
Her testimony painted a picture of a government in a “doom loop” of fatalism, where no senior official was effectively responsible for representing the interests of children during critical decision-making periods.
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Source:
Yahoo
An "Explosion in Vulnerability"
Baroness Longfield detailed the severe and lingering consequences of the pandemic response on children's welfare, education, and mental health, describing the outcome as an “explosion in vulnerability.”
Legal representatives at the inquiry supported her testimony with stark statistics that underscore the ongoing crisis affecting young people in the UK. These figures reveal a system struggling to cope with the fallout.
Key Statistics Highlighted:
The number of persistently absent children from school has doubled.
The number of severely absent children has trebled.
Rates of home education have increased by 80%.
There has been an 80% rise in children with Education Health and Care Plans (EHCPs).
Referrals for autism assessments have tripled, a 300% increase.
Child and adolescent mental ill health is now twice as common as it was in 2017.
Social services referrals for criminal child exploitation are up by 50%.
These figures illustrate the profound and multifaceted damage caused by policies that, according to Longfield, failed to prioritize the nation's youth.
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Source:
Middle East Current Psychiatry - SpringerOpen
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