Sir Keir Starmer has said Boris Johnson’s indecision is responsible for “costing lives” as well as jobs, after the prime minister dramatically cancelled the Christmas plans of millions just days after saying that to do so would be inhuman.
The Labour leader accused the prime minister of “gross negligence” for failing to act sooner to control a rise in coronavirus cases, saying the “alarm bells had been ringing for weeks”.
Sir Keir told an online press conference: “We have a prime minister who is so scared of being unpopular that he is incapable of taking tough decisions until it is too late.”
“It is this indecision and weak leadership that is costing lives and it is costing jobs,” he added.
The opposition leader also called on the prime minister to apologise for continuing to make “the same mistake over and over again" by not taking tough decisions “until he is forced into them at the 11th hour”.
“We can’t go on like that. I think that it is very important that the prime minister does apologise to people for his handling of this episode of the pandemic,” he said.
Last week Labour urged the government to amend its plans to ease coronavirus restrictions over Christmas amid fears over rising case rates. In response, the prime minister accused Sir Keir of wanting to “cancel” Christmas.
On Saturday, however, Mr Johnson was forced to announce a strict new lockdown in vast swathes of southeast England and London. He issued an order to "stay at home", closed shops with just a few hours’ notice and banned gatherings in areas subject to the new tier 4 restrictions.
Across the rest of England, the prime minister said he was dropping the planned five-day relaxation of the rules between 23 and 27 December.
Households will now only be allowed to form Christmas “bubbles” for a single day, on 25 December.
Within hours, both Scotland and Wales announced they had adopted the same policy.
Wales also announced it was entering an immediate lockdown, amid fears over rising case numbers.
The health secretary, Matt Hancock, said the restrictions followed new information about a variant of the coronavirus in the southeast of England.
But doctors accused the government of not following the science, even before it emerged that the new variant is up to 70 per cent more contagious.
Mr Hancock also suggested the new tier 4 restrictions could last months, as ministers battle to bring the pandemic under control.
