New Times,
New Thinking.

  1. Science & Tech
22 April 2020

WATCH: Welsh parliament fumes as health secretary impugns colleague on Zoom

Vaughan Gething was overheard swearing about a fellow Labour assembly member.

By Media Mole

What’s the one thing worse than being a health minister during a global pandemic? Being a health minister during an unprecedented deadly pandemic on Zoom, of course!

During a virtual plenary session of the Welsh Assembly on the notoriously gaffe-tastic video-call platform, the Health and Social Services Secretary Vaughan Gething forgot to mute himself as he swore about his Labour colleage, Jenny Rathbone.

“I tell you what,” he was heard saying, as cameras captured the cringing if his fellow assembly members’ horrified faces, “I know Jenny is regularly [inaudible] but right at the end, it’s like what the fuck is the matter with her?”

He continues to rant about Rathbone as the Llywydd (speaker) Elin Jones tells him repeatedly to mute himself. “Can he turn his microphone off, can we ask members [to turn their microphones off], particularly the Health and Social Services minister?”

Watch it in all its terrible glory here:
 

Select and enter your email address Your weekly guide to the best writing on ideas, politics, books and culture every Saturday. The best way to sign up for The Saturday Read is via saturdayread.substack.com The New Statesman's quick and essential guide to the news and politics of the day. The best way to sign up for Morning Call is via morningcall.substack.com
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how Progressive Media Investments may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
THANK YOU


Hopefully politicians will manage to steer clear of other common Zoom bloopers, such as accidentally revealing to colleagues that you are only suited from the waist up.

Content from our partners
The Circular Economy: Green growth, jobs and resilience
Water security: is it a government priority?
Defend, deter, protect: the critical capabilities we rely on