Former health secretary Matt Hancock has denounced what he said was a “massive betrayal and breach of trust” following the leaking of lockdown Whatsapp messages.

The exchanges were published in The Daily Telegraph after he shared them with journalist Isabel Oakeshott who worked with Mr Hancock on his Pandemic Diaries book.

In a lengthy statement, Mr Hancock denied sending a “menacing message” to Ms Oakeshott – a claim she made last night as she defended breaking a Non Disclosure Agreement (NDA) to leak the messages.

Mr Hancock said: “I am hugely disappointed and sad at the massive betrayal and breach of trust by Isabel Oakeshott. I am also sorry for the impact on the very many people – political colleagues, civil servants and friends – who worked hard with me to get through the pandemic and save lives.

“There is absolutely no public interest case for this huge breach. All the materials for the book have already been made available to the Inquiry, which is the right, and only, place for everything to be considered properly and the right lessons to be learned. As we have seen, releasing them in this way gives a partial, biased account to suit an anti-lockdown agenda.”

He added: “Last night, I was accused of sending menacing messages to Isabel. This is also wrong. When I heard confused rumours of a publication late on Tuesday night, I called and messaged Isabel to ask her if she had ‘any clues’ about it, and got no response. When I then saw what she’d done, I messaged to say it was ‘a big mistake’. Nothing more.”