Boris Johnson and Labour’s Keir Starmer have paid tribute to the nation’s health workers in their Christmas messages.
The Prime Minister used his traditional Christmas Eve address to urge people to come forward for their covid boosters “as a gift not only to their families but the whole country”.
The Tory leader also paid tribute to our NHS staff who are working over Christmas, care workers who have protected the most vulnerable throughout the pandemic and everyone involved in the vaccination campaign.
He urged caution throughout the festive season and expressed hope for a better Christmas this year.
Johnson said: “We must test ourselves and take extra care when meeting elderly or vulnerable relatives. We know that things remain difficult.”
He added: “I hope that people will enjoy this Christmas this year all the more keenly because of what we had to miss last year.
And if the pile of scrumpled wrapping paper is bigger this year it is precisely because across the country, in the run up to Christmas, we have been giving each other an invisible and invaluable present.”
We have been getting that vaccination that protects us and stops us infecting others.”
And though the time for buying presents is theoretically running out, there is still a wonderful thing you can give your family and the whole country and that is to get that jab, whether it is your first or second, or your booster so that next year’s festivities are even better than this year’s.”
Keir Starmer, the leader of the Opposition, also used his Christmas message to pay tribute to key workers for having “saved countless lives” this past year.
The Labour leader thanked NHS workers for vaccinating the country, and armed service men and women both here and abroad for helping to protect us all.
Starmer also reflected on the “unimaginable loss” experienced by many families this year, and that “for too many, there will be one less chair at the table for the Christmas meal”.
Looking ahead to the new year, Starmer urged people to “stick together, support each other and work together” as a “better future is possible”.
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