PM plunges England into even TOUGHER lockdown than March

PM plunges England into even TOUGHER lockdown than March with all schools shut until at least mid-February, ban on takeaway pints and public only able to leave home if ‘essential’ as COVID alert is raised to top level and UK records 58,784 new cases

Boris Johnson set announcing a dramatic new national lockdown for England as mutant Covid strain spreads
Ex-health secretary Jeremy Hunt urged immediate closure of schools, borders with household mixing ban
Matt Hancock said the tiers were no longer strong enough to deal with the mutant version of coronavirus
Suggested public’s failure to comply with all the rules was to blame for inability to control outbreaks in Tier 4
Government’s core ‘Covid-O’ committee has met this morning to decide on the next steps in the response

The brutal new lockdown for England

The measures will come into force when the legal regulations are laid, probably tomorrow, but the PM urged people to follow them immediately.
Primary and secondary schools will be shut from tomorrow until at least February half-term, with only the vulnerable and offspring of key workers allowed to go in.
Nurseries can stay open.
University students are being told to stay at home and study remotely, while exams are said to be unlikely to go ahead as planned.
GCSE and A-Level exams unlikely to go ahead as planned, subject to discussion between DfE and Ofqual.
Non-essential retail, personal care, gyms and all hospitality are being ordered to close across the country.
Cafes, bars and restaurants will be allowed to serve takeaway – but in a tightening from the draconian measures last spring, they will not be allowed to serve any alcohol.
Vulnerable people are being told to shield where possible.
Communal worship can continue with social distancing in place.
The public must only leave home for one of five reasons: to go to work if essential, shop for necessities, exercise – allowed with one other person from another household, care for someone, or to seek medical help.
Childcare bubbles and support bubbles stay in place
Children from split parents can go between homes
Children’s playgrounds remain open.
Elite sports will continue, as can PE lessons and sports clubs for critical worker kids.
Only ‘essential’ international travel is allowed.
Free school meals vouchers will be available during the lockdown.
Driving lessons can continue.

Boris Johnson plunged England into a national lockdown even more brutal than last March tonight in a desperate bid to keep the mutant coronavirus at bay while vaccines are rolled out.

Just a day after he urged parents to send their children back, the PM declared that primary and secondary schools will be shut from tomorrow until at least February half-term, with only the vulnerable and offspring of key workers allowed to go in.

University students are being told to stay at home and study remotely, while exams will not go ahead as planned. Nurseries can stay open.

Non-essential retail, all hospitality, gyms and swimming pools are being ordered to close across the country.

Cafes, bars and restaurants will be allowed to serve takeaway – but in a tightening from the draconian measures last spring, they will not be allowed to serve any alcohol. Vulnerable people are being told to shield where possible. Communal worship can continue with social distancing in place.

The public will once again only be allowed to leave home for one of five reasons: to go to work if essential, shop for necessities, exercise – allowed with one other person from another household, care for someone, or to seek medical help.

The extraordinary third national squeeze will come into effect as soon as regulations are made tomorrow, but Mr Johnson urged the public to adopt the new rules now. MPs will get a vote on them on Wednesday when Parliament is recalled, although there is no prospect of them being defeated. Aides believe there is little chance of them being lifted for at least seven weeks.

In an address from Downing Street, Mr Johnson said: ‘Our hospitals are under more pressure than at any time since the start of the pandemic. It’s clear we need to do more.. while our vaccines are rolled out.’

He said it would not be ‘possible or fair’ for exams to go ahead this summer as normal.

‘The weeks ahead will be the hardest but I really do believe that we are reaching the end of the struggle,’ he said, pledging that by mid-February the top four categories on the vaccine distribution list will have had their first jabs.

But he admitted that he could only give assurance that the situation will improve assuming that ‘our understanding of the virus does not change again’.

Mr Johnson said he was left with no option after being confronted with dire figures by science chiefs today.

Hospital patients with coronavirus had risen by 40 per cent over a week, and are now higher than at the peak of the first wave.

The scale of the problem was underlined as the latest grim daily tally was released, with 58,784 new cases – a 42 per cent rise on last Monday.

It means the UK has passed the milestone of 50,000 infections every day for a week, suggesting that the easing of restrictions at Christmas helped fuel the outbreak.

Department of Health chiefs also posted 407 more deaths, up just 14 per cent on the figure recorded last week. But it can take infected patients several weeks to fall severely ill and succumb to the illness, meaning fatalities have yet to reach their peak and will continue to rise. The UK recorded almost 1,000 deaths twice last week, in grisly tolls not seen since the darkest days of the spring.

Nicola Sturgeon announced a drastic crackdown in the Scottish Parliament this afternoon, with a legally-enforced stay at home order from midnight and schools north of the border set to stay closed until February.

Even the Scilly Isles has not escaped, shifting from Tier 1 straight to full lockdown when the restrictions come into force.

No10 sources insist that the government wants to go back into a tiering system when the virus subsides and vaccinations make it possible.

Labour leader Keir Starmer said the crackdown was ‘essential’ and his MPs will support them.

Senior Tory MPs had joined the Opposition in called for the introduction of another national lockdown. But the idea of hardening the restrictions is likely to spark fury from other Conservatives, who insist the country’s experience of the pandemic shows that lockdowns do not work and are crippling the economy.

On another grim day of coronavirus chaos:

Matt Hancock said he is ‘incredibly worried’ about a new South African variant of coronavirus that experts fear might not be caught by the current crop of vaccines;
Brian Pinker, an 82-year-old retired maintenance manager from Oxford, has become the first to receive the AstraZeneca vaccine outside of trials;
Teaching unions launched a concerted bid to shut down all classrooms despite Boris Johnson’s plea to stay open, leaving millions of parents to begin homeschooling their children for at least a fortnight with often only a few hours’ notice;
The latest data show a 33 per cent rise in the number of confirmed coronavirus patients in hospital in England between Christmas Day and January 2.

In an address from Downing Street, Mr Johnson said: ‘Our hopsitals are under more pressure than at any time since the start of the pandemic. It’s clear we need to do more.. while our vaccines are rolled out.’

Boris Johnson visited Chase Farm Hospital in north London today, with the Oxford University/AstraZeneca vaccine launching

The Joint Biosecurity Centre has recommended today that the Covid-19 alert level be reduced

Jeremy Hunt warned that mutant Covid has put the NHS under ‘off the scale’ pressure compared to normal winters and the government ‘cannot afford to wait’ even one more day

Three-quarters of England already subject to Tier 4, where only essential shops such as supermarkets are allowed to open and people are meant to stay at home

Mr Johnson confirmed this morning that ‘tougher’ measures were coming despite the optimism sparked by the first Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine doses being administered – although at that point he appeared to hint he would prefer to stick with the Tier system in England.

SAGE has cautioned that it is probably impossible to control the new coronavirus variant while they remain open – although experts say a total shutdown still might not be enough to bring the ‘R’ reproduction rate below one.

Michael Gove held a conference call with the First Ministers from the four nations to coordinate strategies. But in a sign of splits, Wales has said it will push ahead with reopening schools over the next fortnight unless there is new evidence about the variant strain.

Earlier, ex-health secretary Jeremy Hunt joined demands from Labour and Tory MPs for an immediate national squeeze with schools and borders shut and a ban on all household mixing.

Mr Hunt warned that mutant Covid has put the NHS under ‘off the scale’ pressure compared to normal winters and the government ‘cannot afford to wait’ even one more day.

Mr Hunt posted on Twitter: ‘To those arguing winter is always like this in the NHS: you are wrong. I faced four serious winter crises as Health Sec and the situation now is off-the-scale worse than any of those.’

Mr Hunt said the ‘No1 lesson’ from the pandemic is that countries can ‘save lives and get their economies back to normal faster’ if they ‘act early and decisively’.

‘We therefore cannot afford to wait: all schools should be closed, international travel stopped, household mixing limited and the tier system reviewed so that the highest tier really does bring down infection levels,’ Mr Hunt said.

‘The good news is that unlike before these restrictions will be time limited to the 12 weeks or so it will take to get the vaccine out to those most vulnerable to covid – so there is light at the end of the tunnel.’

Mr Hunt was among a growing band of Conservative MPs, including ex-No10 adviser Neil O’Brien, urging emergency steps to tackle the coronavirus surge.

Labour has also been pushing for a squeeze, with Sadiq Khan saying Mr Hunt was ‘spot on’.

Earlier Matt Hancock suggested the first step will be to escalate even more of the country into Tier 4, saying Tier 3 did not seem able to hold back the more infectious version of the deadly disease.

He insisted the problem was partly down to people failing to obey the rules, amid calls from some MPs for police to be given more powers.

But there were questions about how much more impact extending the coverage of Tier 4 could have, given three-quarters of England is already subject to the harshest bracket, where only essential shops such as supermarkets are allowed to open and people are meant to stay at home.

Dr Yvonne Doyle, medical director for Public Health England (PHE), said the latest daily figures were a ‘bitter warning’ about the threat.

‘The continuous rise in cases and deaths should be a bitter warning for us all. We must not forget the basics – the lives of our friends and family depend on it,’ she said.

Speaking during a visit to Chase Farm Hospital in north London this morning, Mr Johnson warned of ‘tough tough’ weeks to come.

He added: ‘If you look at the numbers there’s no question we will have to take tougher measures and we will be announcing those in due course.’

Mr Johnson tried to strike a positive note, promising there will be a ‘massive ramp up’ in vaccination numbers.

He added: ‘There’s a massive ramp up operation now going on.

‘The rate limiting factor is now not supply of vaccines although we want that to go faster, it’s getting them properly tested and getting them to the NHS.

‘It’s not the ability to distribute the vaccine, it’s not the shortage of staff.

‘It’s getting it properly tested. That will ramp up in the weeks ahead.’

Asked in a round of interviews about the prospect of a national lockdown, Mr Hancock said: ‘We don’t rule anything out, and we’ve shown repeatedly that we will look at the public health advice and we will take the public health advice in terms of what is needed to control the spread of the disease.’

Pressed whether changes could be announced over the next 24 hours, he replied: ‘We have shown we are ready to move incredibly quickly… We look at the data on a daily basis.’

Mr Hancock said the ‘old tier system is no longer strong enough’ because the new variant is ‘much easier to catch, it is much more transmissible, and we’re now seeing the effect of that in lots of different parts of the country’.

Challenged on Sky News over whether Tier 4 restrictions work, Mr Hancock said: ‘It is down to people’s behaviour, frankly. What matters is, yes of course, the rules that we put in place, but it is also about how people act.

‘And frankly what I would say is this: it is critical that everybody in the country does all that they can to reduce the spread of the virus.’

In a stark message about the length of the fight the UK faces, Mr Hancock said the problem was ‘how we collectively as a society keep this under control for the next couple of months… until the vaccines can make us safe’.

The Government’s ‘Covid-O’ committee, which makes decisions on lockdown restrictions, is thought to have meet today to decide on the next steps to take.

Ms Sturgeon announced this afternoon that Scotland will be plunged back into a national coronavirus lockdown from midnight.

The SNP leader said the new crackdown, lasting all of January, will include a legally enforceable stay-at-home rule.

Scotland in national lockdown from midnight

Scotland will be plunged back into a national coronavirus lockdown from midnight this evening, Nicola Sturgeon announced this afternoon.

The SNP leader said the new crackdown, lasting all of January, will include a legally enforceable stay-at-home rule.

Exercise and essential journeys will be the only reasons why people will be allowed to leave their homes.

The planned reopening of schools on January 18 is also being pushed back to February 1 at the earliest while workers are being instructed to work from home wherever possible.

Rules on outdoor gatherings will be tightened to allow a maximum of just two people from two households to meet.

Meanwhile, places of worship will be closed from this Friday but weddings and funerals will still be allowed to go ahead.

A maximum of 20 people will be allowed to attend funeral services and a maximum of five people will be allowed to attend weddings.

Ms Sturgeon said the tough new curbs are necessary because of the ‘steeply rising’ rate of infections north of the border as she warned the lockdown could be extended beyond January if necessary.

The measures effectively mean a return to the restrictions seen during the first UK-wide lockdown which was imposed at the end of March last year.

All of mainland Scotland is already placed in the highest tier of Covid-19 rules but case numbers have prompted Ms Sturgeon to take more drastic action after 2,464 new cases were announced yesterday.