Prime
Minister Boris Johnson has called on the public to "summon the discipline
and the resolve" to follow the new coronavirus rules announced across the
UK on Tuesday.
In a television broadcast to the country he
warned that new restrictions could last six months, and that the government may
go further if people do not stick to them.
In England, rules on face coverings were
expanded, with the fines for flouting the rules increasing to £200 on the first
offence, and pubs restaurants and other hospitality venues will have to close
by 10pm.
Hospitality venues will also have to close
early in Scotland and Wales - but Scotland has gone further, banning people
from visiting other people's homes.
Are these new measures enough to avoid a
second national lockdown?
Political Editor Nick Watt reports and Emily
Maitlis is joined by former Conservative Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, who now
chairs the commons health select committee.
Newsnight
is the BBC's flagship news and current affairs TV programme - with analysis,
debate, exclusives, and robust interviews.
Follow new Covid restrictions or risk a second
lockdown, Johnson warns
PM says he is prepared for harsher restrictions, if
new measures do not cut down virus’ spread
Heather
Stewart & Jessica Elgot
Tue 22 Sep
2020 21.04 BSTLast modified on Wed 23 Sep 2020 04.36 BST
Boris
Johnson has warned the weary British public to summon their resolve for a tough
winter ahead, as he refused to rule out a second national lockdown to contain
the spread of the coronavirus.
Speaking in
a televised address after announcing new rules across England he appeared to
suggest “freedom-loving” Britons will be to blame if more draconian
restrictions are applied.
“If people
don’t follow the rules we have set out, then we must reserve the right to go
further,” he said.
The new
restrictions for England include a 10pm closing time for pubs and restaurants,
a renewed ban on indoor team sports, and stricter rules on mask-wearing.
They come
in addition to the “rule of six” limiting the size of social gatherings, and a
complex patchwork of local restrictions across the UK.
Office
staff in England will also be urged to work from home where possible, less than
a month after Downing Street said it was planning an advertising campaign to
tempt them back into the workplace.
The new
regime led to immediate calls for fresh emergency financial support for the
worst-affected sectors.
Introducing
an outright ban on households mixing at home, the first minister, Nicola
Sturgeon, told MSPs at Holyrood her priority was to “address the key driver of
infections”, saying both social distancing and good ventilation are hard to
maintain in domestic visits.
Sturgeon
urged the Scottish public to “try to keep smiling, keep hoping and keep looking
out for each other”.
Fresh
Covid-19 restrictions were extended to all of Northern Ireland on Tuesday
evening. There can be no mixing of households indoors, with some exemptions,
while no more than six people from two households can meet in a garden.
Previously,
the measures only applied to Belfast and Ballymena in County Antrim.
Wales
announced a package of measures broadly similar to those announced by Johnson.
Pubs, cafes and restaurants will have to close at 10pm, and must only provide
table service.
The need
for fresh action to contain the virus was underlined by official figures
showing the number of new coronavirus cases across the UK had shot up to 4,926.
That is the highest daily figure since May, though many more tests are now
being carried out.
Chris
Whitty and Patrick Vallance, the government’s most senior scientific and
medical advisers, warned the public on Monday that the UK had “turned a corner”
for the worse, and could have 50,000 new cases a day by mid-October.
Johnson
used the address to stress the importance of complying with the new rules.
In language
that appeared designed to evoke his hero Winston Churchill’s wartime
broadcasts, he said: “Never in our history has our collective destiny and our
collective health depended so completely on our individual behaviour.
“Now is the
time for us all to summon the discipline, and the resolve, and the spirit of
togetherness that will carry us through.”
His stark
warning to the public contrasted with the view of the Labour leader, Keir
Starmer, who said in his party conference speech that a second lockdown would
be “a sign of government failure, not an act of God”.
The new
measures for England come after a weekend of tense debate among cabinet
ministers and scientists and were softer than those mooted in advice from
experts in recent weeks, which had included a two-week full lockdown as a
“circuit-breaker”.
With a rebellion
already brewing in advance of next week’s six-month renewal of the emergency
coronavirus legislation, Tory whips had been canvassing support among restive
backbenchers about what level of fresh restrictions they would be willing to
support.
Ben Bradley,
the Conservative MP for Mansfield, said economic support was needed for
affected sectors but MPs could tolerate today’s measures.
“Number 10
is caught between a rock and a hard place here, and I know that they need to be
seen to take action for a variety of reasons,” Bradley said. “What I’m very
conscious of though is a general feeling among many of my constituents that
they don’t want further restrictions.
“Of course
from an ideological perspective neither I nor most colleagues are naturally
comfortable with ‘big government’ and draconian measures, nor is that what the
public voted us in for. I think we’ve perhaps reached the point where we’d find
it really difficult to sell much more than this to our constituents.”
One
new-intake Conservative MP said: “The mood from colleagues and from my
constituents is, ‘this far and no further’.”
Business
groups were taken aback by the signal from Downing Street that restrictions are
likely to last until next spring.
Kate
Nicholls, the chief executive of UK Hospitality, called the latest measures a
“crushing blow”, while the Bank of England governor, Andrew Bailey, urged the
chancellor, Rishi Sunak, to “stop and rethink” plans to end the job retention
scheme for all sectors at the end of next month.
Julian
Knight, chair of the culture select committee, said: “Today’s developments make
unarguable the need to extend beyond October the furlough scheme which offers a
lifeline for many who work in the arts and leisure sectors, a case we have
already made to the chancellor.”
Tracey
Crouch, the former sports minister, has also called for further support
measures. “Sport is a complex ecosystem that contributes billions to the economy
both directly and indirectly,” she said. “Without financial support we could
see parts of the sector decimated and lost forever.”
Nickie
Aiken, the Conservative MP for the Cities of London and Westminster, said the
impact on local businesses “will now be overwhelming” and called for an urgent
rethink of support available.
She said
cafes and bars could be forced to close by the cumulative impact of fewer
customers and restricted hours, and that the conference and events sector was
“reeling from the announcement that their work will not start on 1 October and
potentially may not restart for six months”.
Dr Chaand
Nagpaul, chair of the British Medical Association, criticised the government
for not going far enough.
“The prime
minister missed an opportunity today to revise the ‘rule of six’ which, as
currently interpreted, allows members of six different household to meet
indoors whereas previously members of only two households could do so,” he
said.
“Data
suggests that transmission between households is by far the biggest driver of
infection and this should therefore be rectified at the earliest possible
opportunity.”
Speaking in
the House of Commons earlier, the prime minister had stressed the importance of
protecting the economy, as well as saving lives. “This is a package to drive
down the R [the reproduction rate of the virus], but also to allow education
and jobs and growth to continue,” he said.
In tetchy
exchanges, Johnson also repeatedly attacked Labour for criticising the test and
trace system, which has led teachers and parents to complain about being unable
to book tests for sick children, or being sent hundreds of miles.
Johnson
told Barnsley MP Stephanie Peacock: “Testing and tracing has very little or
nothing to do with the spread and transmission of the disease. The spread and
the transmission of the disease is caused by contact between human beings and
all the things that we’re trying to minimise.”
Challenged
over why Germany and Italy had achieved lower Covid-19 case numbers without
renewed lockdowns, Johnson suggested it was because the UK was “a
freedom-loving country”.
“It is very
difficult to ask the British population uniformly to obey guidelines in the way
that is necessary,” he added.
The mayor
of London, Sadiq Khan, welcomed the additional new measures for England but
said the capital may still need extra restrictions.
Khan’s spokesman
said in Tuesday’s Cobra meeting, Johnson and Kahn “discussed the
rapidly-worsening situation in London, including increasing ICU [intensive care
unit] admission rates, and the need to go further now to prevent a disastrous
full lockdown in future including mandatory face coverings for hospitality
workers and more widespread wearing of face coverings.
“It is
clear that London has unique needs and challenges and additional measures need
to be examined which are suitable for the capital.”
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