The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has found insufficient evidence to prosecute two people suspected of unlawfully obtaining and disclosing CCTV footage of Matt Hancock kissing his former aide, Gina Coladangelo.
The regulator launched a criminal investigation after it received a report of a personal data breach from DHSC’s CCTV operator, EMCOR Group plc.
Mr Hancock quit in June last year after The Sun published images taken on 6 May 2021 showing him in an embrace with Ms Coladangelo.
The video taken in May shows the health secretary opening a door and checking to see if anybody is around before motioning to Gina Coladangelo.
The 43-year-old aide walks towards Mr Hancock before they become entwined together in a passionate embrace in the corridors of power at Whitehall.
Given the seriousness of the report and the wider implications it potentially had for the security of information across government, the ICO had a legal duty to carry out an impartial assessment of the evidence available to determine if there had been a breach of the law.
Forensic analysis revealed that the leaked images were most likely obtained by someone recording the CCTV footage screens with a mobile phone.
Six phones retrieved during the execution of search warrants did not contain the relevant CCTV footage. After taking legal advice, the ICO concluded that there was insufficient evidence to charge anyone with criminal offences under the Data Protection Act 2018.
As a result the ICO confirmed it would be closing its investigation.
In a tell-all interview with The Diary of a CEO podcast last month, Mr Hancock has now revealed he “fell in love with somebody” and it “all happened very quickly” – but insisted he did not break the law.
He said: “I resigned because I broke the social distancing guidelines.
“By then, 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. That happened because I fell in love with somebody.”
Two-metre social distancing guidance was in place at the time, while a ban on hugging between people in different households wasn’t lifted until two weeks later.
Ms Coladangelo, whom Mr Hancock met when they both worked in student radio at Oxford University, was a non-executive director at the Department of Health at the time, earning at least £15,000 a year.
Matt Hancock and Gina Coladangelo pictured as they leave the BBC in London on 6 June 2021
Mr Hancock told the podcast Ms Coladangelo, whom he has known “for more than half [his] life”, was brought in to help with public communications.
Mr Hancock was also keen to stress that his and Ms Coladangelo’s relationship was not “casual sex”.
The then-health secretary had warned people to “be careful” about the risk of coronavirus when those rules were relaxed in September 2020 for couples in “established relationships”.
A visibly uncomfortable Mr Hancock asked Mr Bartlett to start the section of questioning again without the reference to casual sex.
Matt Hancock broke then Covid rules with the kiss which took place in his office
