UK: Former health secretary Matt Hancock denies breaking COVID-19 rules by kissing aide

Embattled ex-British health secretary Matt Hancock on Monday said that he believes he did not break any law by having an affair with a close aide during the COVID-19 lockdown. The ex-UK secretary stated that the controversy destroyed his political career and it was not about a “casual intimate relationship”. Hancock told The Diary of a CEO podcast on Monday that he fell in love with Gina Coladangelo while they worked together during the pandemic, and it wasn’t a hookup. "It actually happened after the rules were lifted, but the guidance was still in place. I resigned because I broke the social distancing guidelines by then," Matt Hancock told his host Dragons' Den investor Steven Bartlett. 

"They weren't actually rules. They weren't the law. But that's not the point. The point is they were the guidelines that I'd been proposing. And that happened because I fell in love with somebody.' People had to stay two meters apart from anyone outside their household or bubble, under the guidance at the time," said Britain's ex health secretary, condemning that he had to resign from his ministerial duties on the business podcast. 

Ex British Health Sec resigned for kissing a female aide during COVID-19 lockdown

British Cabinet minister Matt Hancock had resigned as the Health Secretary last year as calls intensified for him to step down. Lawmakers accused Hancock of the breach of COVID-19 lockdown for kissing a female aide. In a letter to the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Hancock had announced his resignation. Johnson's health Secretary noted that he "owes it to people who have sacrificed so much in this pandemic to be honest when we have let them down." Hancock then reiterated his apology for not distancing himself from aides that were outside the COVID-19 bubble. Separately in footage on Twitter, Hancock had explained, "I have been to see the Prime Minister resign as secretary of state for health and social care." 

On Monday, however, speaking about the controversy Hancock stressed that Miss Coladangelo, the woman whom he was found with, has been more than just an aide and that he had known her for 'more than half of my life.' He added that the two worked at student radio at Oxford University together. "We spent a lot of time together, ironically, trying to get me to be able to communicate in a more emotionally intelligent way, we fell in love. And that's something that was completely outside of my control," reminded Matt Hancock. He then condemned the measures taken by Boris Johnson administration, as he said "Government knew some measures it took during the pandemic were 'very damaging'".