All of Nottinghamshire will remain under Tier 3 restrictions after Christmas, the Government has confirmed.
Health Secretary Matt Hancock announced changes would be brought in for some parts of the country on Boxing Day in an announcement from Downing Street on Wednesday afternoon (December 23).
Amid growing concerns of rising cases and evidence of the new mutant strain of coronavirus in more parts of the country, a number of areas will move Tier 4 - similar to lockdown - restrictions from 00.01 on Boxing Day (Saturday, December 26).
Nottingham and Nottinghamshire was not included in the list of places changing Tiers and will therefore remain in its current Tier 3 restrictions.
Speaking at a Downing Street press conference, Mr Hancock said: “From 00.01 on Boxing Day Sussex, Oxfordshire, Suffolk, Norfolk and Cambridgeshire, those parts of Essex not yet in Tier 4, Waverley in Surrey and Hampshire including Portsmouth and Southampton but with the exception of the New Forest will all be escalated to Tier 4.”
Matt Hancock also outlined other areas of England moving up to higher tiers.
He added: “Bristol, Gloucestershire, Somerset including the North Somerset council area, Swindon, the Isle of Wight, the New Forest and Northamptonshire as well as Cheshire and Warrington will all be escalated to Tier 3.
“And I’m afraid that Cornwall and Herefordshire have seen sharply rising rates and need to be escalated to Tier 2.”
Tier 4 was first introduced in London and other areas of the south east on Saturday (December 19) from midnight.
Mr Hancock said more areas needed to be escalated as he said there had been a 57 percent rise in cases over the past week, with 1,909 hospital admissions a day and more than 18,000 people currently in hospital with Covid-19.
He added he was "truly sorry for the disruption" caused by the changes adding "we simply cannot have the Christmas that we all yearn for."
Two cases of another new strain of Covid-19 linked to South Africa have also been identified in the UK, Matt Hancock said.
