There follows a letter from Alan Miller, Co-Founder of the Together Declaration, to Maggie Throup MP, whose recent response to Daily Sceptic reader Richard Morgan revealed that vaccine passports are ready to be “toggled” on when required. The document Ms. Throup enclosed explained: “The Government may introduce a mandatory Covid Pass to access high risk venues if the data suggests further measures are necessary to protect the NHS.” Alan asks Ms. Throup why she denied this in her cover letter as he warns once again of the serious threat to liberty of vaccine passports.
Dear Maggie Throup MP,
On behalf of Together’s now 300,000 signatories in the U.K., we were extremely concerned to read a media report on September 5th (“Vaccine Passports Are Alive and Kicking”) based on a new Freedom of Information request stating:
In April 2022, an Invitation to Tender (ITT) was issued by NHSX, and a Danish company called Netcompany Ltd won the £18m bid to: “Deliver the NHS Covid Pass App live service including operational management, incident management and support, and app development services.” …
Through a Freedom of Information request, I obtained a copy of the scope of works for the project (Department for Health & Social Security, Specification for Covid Pass Delivery Partner, Reference: C50516). On page nine is the following operational requirement:
“Domestic Pass for use in Voluntary and Mandatory Settings.
“The Government may introduce a mandatory Covid Pass to access high risk venues if the data suggests further measures are necessary to protect the NHS. In preparation for this eventuality, we have built the changes to support two levels of domestic passes. The functionality will be toggled off until required. This enables a quick response if/when the Government invokes a mandate. If a citizen is fully vaccinated, medically exempt or has been in a clinical trial, they will be eligible for an ‘all venues’ (mandatory) pass. If a citizen only has natural immunity or negative test results, they will only be eligible for a ‘limited venues’ (voluntary) pass.”
The covering letter from Maggie Throup, the MP fronting the programme, states:
“Although domestic certification is no longer being used in the U.K., the NHS Covid Pass still requires updating and maintaining for travel purposes.” This is plainly at odds with the operational requirement quoted above, where far more than travel purposes are envisaged.
In a few months, Together’s ‘Declaration’ was signed by 200,000 people in the U.K. to reject vaccine passports or any similar form of medical certification in the United Kingdom. We represent more than 200 organisations, business groups, campaigners and professionals who were and remain gravely concerned about the use of vaccine passports.
The introduction of vaccine passports was one of the most divisive proposals the Government sought to introduce. It was ill-founded from the start, and many see this project as a Trojan horse for introducing mandatory Digital I.D.
Of course, for a very long time Government denied there was any possibility of vaccine passports at all. Vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi told the U.K. public on BBC TV on February 7th 2021 that vaccine passports would be “discriminatory” and reassured the public that the Government had “no plans” to introduce them in Britain, even commenting “that’s not how we do things in the U.K.”.
There never was support for this authoritarian project, as seen by findings from your “Call for Evidence” consultation in March 2021. Over 52,000 people responded, and most voted against the introduction of vaccine passports.
In September 2021, the then Health Secretary Sajid Javid indicated that plans for vaccine passports had been scrapped. Yet, at the end of 2021 the Government introduced them anyway before supposedly withdrawing them in January 2022.
Clearly we see the invitation to tender was issued April 2022.
Then, on June 8th, Sir Desmond Swayne MP posed the question to Sajid Javid in Parliament: Why was the Department of Health even then advertising for a “permanent position” on £71,000 a year for “Deputy Director, Delivery Lead – Covid Pass?” for a programme that had supposedly ended? Javid’s response was deeply unconvincing.
‘Covid Pass’ seems to be the initiative that can never die. Is it any wonder the Government suffers from a perceived lack of trustworthiness when it apparently does not respect the wishes of British citizens or sticks to its Ministers’ briefings?
In the U.K., we enjoy many hard-won liberties and rights, all fought for and defended by our ancestors. These rights are not only fundamental to our understanding of democracy, they are rights we believe all humans should have. Some of us are lucky enough to have been born with these rights, but others have experienced the perils of segregation, suppression and surveillance first hand.
Therefore, on behalf of all Together Declaration signatories, given what the FOI request appears to have revealed, we request from you a clear answer to the question:
Given your statement that “Although domestic certification is no longer being used in the U.K., the NHS Covid Pass still requires updating and maintaining for travel purposes”, there can be only two explanations for the information revealed by the Freedom of Information request: either your covering letter was deliberately disingenuous, or you had not actually read the Specification behind your covering letter. Which is it?
Yours sincerely,
Alan Miller
Co-Founder Together
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