Protesters lay on the street outside Dominic Cummings' house in a "die-in" on Thursday evening in protest against the Government's response to coronavirus.
Wearing masks and holding signs, around 20 campaigners joined the demonstration in north London, two weeks since news broke of the Downing Street adviser's relocation to Durham and drive to Barnard Castle during the UK lockdown.
The protesters were outside Mr Cummings' property for around 30 minutes and told the PA news agency they were all socially distanced.
They added the response from the street was "largely positive", with around 15 neighbours joining them and one leading a chant of "Black Lives Matter".
READ MORE: Crash victims lodge complaint over Dominic Cummings' lockdown 60-mile drive with 'affected' vision
"Over 50,000 dead while you're playing king of the castle," read one of the group's signs.
One protester, Sita Bilani, was unable to attend the funeral of her aunt, who died with Covid-19 in April, due to social distancing measures and said: "It's insulting to hear Boris Johnson say we should 'move on'.
"The lack of remorse, not just for Cummings' disregard for the rules but for the thousands of preventable deaths is a disgrace."
The Metropolitan Police said they attended the protest and dispersed it after a "short time", adding that no arrests were made.
Protesters said they are calling on the Government to sack Mr Cummings and implement a strategy to tackling the pandemic based on World Health Organisation (WHO) recommendations.
They also called for Public Health England to publish its "full findings" of its review which this week found black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) people are at significantly higher risk of dying from Covid-19.
The protesters said they intend to build on the action and make more demonstrations on the issue.
READ MORE: More than one million people sign petition calling for sacking of Dominic Cummings
Two weeks ago in a press conference about his trip to Durham, Mr Cummings said his home in London has been a "target for harassment".
"I did not make my movements public at the time, because my London home was already a target," Mr Cummings said.
"I did not believe I was obliged to make my parents' home and my sister's home a target for harassment as well."
MPs on both sides of the political divide called for Mr Cummings' resignation over the trip, including Scotland minister Douglas Ross who quit the Government over the issue.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel