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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Andrew Sparrow

Containment of virus 'extremely unlikely to work on its own', says Boris Johnson – as it happened

Boris Johnson's press conference - Summary

Here are the main points from the press conference held by Boris Johnson. He was joined by Prof Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical adviser, and Sir Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser.

  • Ministers will within a fortnight advise anyone with a fever or a mild respiratory tract infection to stay at home for seven days, Whitty revealed. He said that the government was not giving out this advice now, because the chances of someone with a fever now having coronavirus are very low, he said. But he said that would change very quickly. Soon the number of infections would rise “really quite fast”, he said. He went on:

We are now very close to the time, probably within the next 10 to 14 days, when the modelling would imply we should move to a situation where everybody with even minor respiratory tract infections or a fever should be self-isolating for a period of seven days.

This advice is likely to have huge repercussions for workplaces across the country.

  • Johnson stressed that it was important for the government not to implement its delay and mitigating measures too early. He said:

It is absolutely critical in managing the spread of this virus that we take the right decisions at the right time based on the latest and the best evidence, so we mustn’t do things which have no or limited medical benefit, nor things which could turn out actually to be counter-productive.

He sounded more defensive on this point than he was when he held a press conference last week, reflecting the fact that the government is starting to face criticism for allegedly being too complacent.

  • Johnson said that he was no longer shaking hands. Last week he was still shaking hands, but he said at today’s Commonwealth Day service he was advised against this. He explained:

We were all given an instruction not to shake hands and there’s a good reason for not shaking hands, which is that the behavioural psychologists say that if you don’t shake somebody’s hand then that sends an important message to them about the importance of washing your hands.

So there’s a subliminal cue there to everybody to wash your hands, which is, I think I’m right in saying ... far more important.

  • Whitty refused to comment on suggestions that 2m people might be hospitalised. He said figures like this were “largely speculative”.
  • Whitty said that from tomorrow the government would start screening everyone arriving at hospital with a respiratory illness for coronavirus. Until now people have only been screened if they are in intensive care and have coronavirus-type symptoms, he said.
  • Vallance said the aim of the measures to be introduced by the government would be to lower the mortality rate of those in the at-risk group by 20 to 30%. But he said it would be wrong to try to “suppress” the disease completely because it could result in a winter outbreak at a time of maximum pressure for the NHS. He said:

What you can’t do is suppress this thing completely, and what you shouldn’t do is suppress it completely because all that happens then is it pops up again later in the year when the NHS is at a more vulnerable stage in the winter and you end up with another problem.

That’s all from me for today.

Thanks for the comments.

Updated

This is what Boris Johnson said at the start of his press conference.

I want to stress the following things. First, we are doing everything we can to combat this outbreak based on the latest scientific and medical advice.

Second, we have a truly brilliant NHS where staff have responded with all the determination, compassion and skill that makes their service so revered across the world and they will continue to have this government’s full support, my support, in tackling this virus on the front line.

Third, we will set out further steps in the days and weeks ahead to help people protect themselves, their family and in particularly the elderly and vulnerable.

Finally, while it is absolutely critical in managing the spread of this virus that we take the right decisions at the right time based on the latest and the best evidence, so we mustn’t do things which have no or limited medical benefit, nor things which could turn out actually to be counter productive, there is no hiding from the fact that the coronavirus outbreak will present significant challenges for the UK just as it does in other countries.

But if we continue to look out for one another, to pull together in a united and national effort, I have no doubt that we can and will rise to that challenge.

Boris Johnson (centre) with Prof Chris Whitty (left) and Sir Patrick Vallance at their press conference.
Boris Johnson (centre) with Prof Chris Whitty (left) and Sir Patrick Vallance at their press conference. Photograph: Alberto Pezzali/PA

Johnson is wrapping up now.

He says he hopes he has explained why the somewhat counter-intuitive decision not to cancel sporting events etc has been taken.

And he says the government will give out more advice later this week.

He says other measures will prove necessary. But timing of these measures is crucial.

This is a big national challenge, and it will become a bigger one, he says. But he says it is obvious to him that “we know how to defeat it”.

He says he wants to be as transparent as possible.

And that’s it. He has finished.

I will post a summary soon.

Vallance says the government hopes that the measures it is taking will reduce the death rate amongst those most at risk by 20 or 30%.

He says it is not possible to suppress the disease completely.

And he says that would not be desirable, because that would just lead to the disease popping up again later.

Q: Have you stopped shaking hands?

Johnson says, at the Commonwealth Day service today, people were advised not to shake hands. Not shaking hands sends out a subliminal message, he says; it tells people that hands may be dirty.

But he says washing hands is more important than not shaking hands.

  • Johnson says he is no longer shaking hands. At his press conference last week, he said he was still shaking hands with people.

Whitty says, when the government does ask people to stay at home (see 5.04pm) if they have a fever or a mild respiratory tract infection, they will be asked to stay at home for seven days.

Q: Are people who are stockpiling being prudent? And are you confident you will be able to keep the shelves stocked?

Johnson says it is important for people to behave responsibly and to think of others.

He says more advice will be released to the public within the next few days.

  • Johnson urges anyone thinking of stockpiling to “behave responsibly” and to think of others.

Johnson says this will become a much more significant outbreak than it currently is. But it is important to take the necessary steps “at the right time”, he says.

Q: Other governments are taking more drastic steps now. Is that due to political pressure? And are you sure we should not be doing the same thing?

Johnson says the epidemiology may be different in one country from another.

When the government moves into the delay phase, it won’t abandon the contain mode either, he says.

Whitty says, as you start in delay phase, most of the things you will do will be things you were doing when you were in the contain phase too.

Within a fortnight anyone with fever will be advised to self-isolate, says chief medical adviser

Whitty says, in an average year, about 8,000 people die from flu.

He says at the moment the ratio between people with coronavirus and people with other respiratory diseases is very low.

But that will change soon, he says.

He says coronavirus will soon spread “really quite fast”.

  • Whitty says soon coronavirus will spread “really quite fast”.
  • Whitty says within about 10 to 14 days the government will advise people with even minor respiratory tract infections or a fever to self-isolate. But is because by that point the chances of their having coronavirus will be much higher than they are now.

UPDATE: Here is some video.

Updated

Prof Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical adviser, is speaking now.

He says the government is going to start testing all people in intensive care, and all people in hospital with respiratory conditions, for coronavirus.

He says the government will soon reach the point where it needs to ask people to change their behaviour.

Updated

Sir Patrick Vallance, the chief scientific adviser, is speaking now.

He says the government wants to push the peak of the outbreak into the summer.

He says a series of actions have been modelled.

They will be reviewed through SAGE, the scientific advisory group for emergency.

The actions can be modelled for their efficacy, he says.

He says it is important to act at the right time. If you tell people now with a sniffle to go into isolation, you will catch a lot of people who do not have coronavirus.

  • Vallance says it is important to introduce measures to delay the spread of coronavirus “at the right time in the right combinations”.

Updated

Boris Johnson's press conference

Boris Johnson is holding a press conference now.

He says Cobra, the government’s emergency committee, received a briefing this morning from Prof Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical adviser, and Sir Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser.

  • Johnson says the UK is still “in the contain phase of the outbreak”. But he says the scientists have said “containment is extremely unlikely to work on its own.”
  • He says the government is now preparing to move to the “delay” phase of the coronavirus action plan.

Updated

Earlier the House of Commons and the House of Lords commissions held a joint meeting to discuss coronavirus. Afterwards they released this statement.

The commissions of both houses met today to discuss parliament’s response to coronavirus. There are no plans to suspend parliament. We continue to act entirely in line with the advice of Public Health England and the Speakers and political leadership of both houses are keeping the situation under constant review.

Back in the Commons the Tory Philip Hollobone asks why the UK is not banning flights from northern Italy.

Because there are many Britons there who want to come home, says Hancock. And because the evidence suggests that banning flights does not work. He points out that Italy banned flights from China, and that that did not work.

Nigel Farage, the Brexit party leader, is (like Rory Stewart) accusing the government of being too complacent about coronavirus.

Schools should be shut now, says former Tory cabinet minister Rory Stewart

Rory Stewart, the former Tory cabinet minister who is now running as an independent candidate for London mayor, has said that the government should be acting “much more aggressively” to contain coronavirus and that schools should be shut now. In a statement he said:

The government has made a serious mistake today. They should be acting much more aggressively to contain coronavirus.

Schools should be shut now. If the government are not prepared to shut them now, they should - at the very least - state clearly and transparently what their triggers will be for closing schools over the next few days.

All medium and large gatherings should be cancelled. All passengers coming from hotspots should be tested and quarantined. There is no excuse for passengers not being tested off a plane from Milan last night.

There is no justification for half-hearted measures. The government and the Mayor keep saying they are simply following “scientific advice”. But the scientists are clear that this is now a political decision - on whether the government are prepared to spend very serious sums of money, and take a large economic hit, to maximise protection of the population.

China shows both the dangers of acting too slowly - at first - and then the benefits of acting decisively. We should have no regrets about spending money to do the absolute maximum to prevent the spread of this disease.

Downing Street said earlier that it thought there was not point testing passengers returning to the UK from Northern Italy because temperature tests on arrival were not effective. (See 1.17pm.)

Former Tory cabinet minister Rory Stewart.
Former Tory cabinet minister Rory Stewart. Photograph: Dominic Lipinski/PA

From Politics Home’s Matt Honeycombe-Foster

From my colleague Rowena Mason

From Sky’s Tom Rayner

Jeremy Hunt, the former health secretary, told Hancock that he thought the public needed to know what the government’s central estimate was of how many people would die from coronavirus.

Hancock told Hunt that he would reflect on this, but that there were lots of uncertainties.

Yesterday the Sunday Times (paywall) claimed that 100,000 was the government’s central estimate for the death toll. It said:

Officials in Whitehall last week began describing a 100,000 figure as the “central estimate” of the potential death toll, according to a source involved in the preparations, rather than the previously publicised worst case scenario of 500,000 deaths if 80% of the population were infected ...

A second official said the “ballpark” figure for expected deaths across all councils was “in the region of 100,000”. That includes those likely to die from seasonal flu, which averaged 17,000 over the past five years.

One official who has been involved in the planning said: “The central estimate of deaths is about 100,000. Everyone has been focusing on the worst case but this is what the experts actually expect to happen. Some of those people would have died of other flus.”

The figure is just under half the number of British deaths to Spanish flu in 1918, the worst modern pandemic. Covid-19 has already infected 80,000 people in China, killing more than 3,000 of its population of almost 1.4 billion. Italy, with a 60 million population, has suffered more than 200 deaths from some 5,800 cases. The UK had 209 cases by last night with two deaths.

Matt Hancock's statement on coronavirus

Here are the main points from Matt Hancock’s response to the urgent question on coronavirus.

  • Hancock said there have now been four deaths from coronavirus in the UK. The fourth fatality has only just been announced.
  • He said as of this morning there had been 319 cases of coronavirus in the UK.
  • He said the UK would “make the right choices of which action to pursue at the right moment”. It would be a mistake to act too early, he said:

The scientific advice is clear: acting too early creates its own risk. So we will do what is right to keep people safe. Guided by the science, we will act at the right time.

  • He said the number of cases in China and South Korea was still rising, but at a slowing rate. But he said the number of cases in Iran, Italy, Switzerland, France and Germany was growing. In Italy there were 1,492 more cases overnight, and 102 more deaths.
  • He said Public Health England had tested nearly 25,000, and the time taken to carry out tests was being reduced.
  • He said the government was making available an extra £46m to find a vaccine and develop more rapid diagnostic tests.
  • He said the NHS was “well prepared”, with record numbers of doctors and nurses.
  • He said an extra 700 people had been taken on to help the 111 phone line take calls.
  • He said responding to coronovirus was a “national effort” and everyone would have to play their part. For members of the public, that meant washing hands and following public health advice. But it could also mean volunteering, he said.
  • He said the government would soon bring forward emergency legislation to help people and services deal with the outbreak. The bill would be “temporary and proportionate”, he said.
  • He said the government was taking action to help Britons on the Grand Princess cruise ship off the coast of California to come home.
Matt Hancock (right), with Prof Chris Whitty, the chief medical officer for England.
Matt Hancock (right), with Prof Chris Whitty, the chief medical officer for England.
 Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA

Hancock says the government will soon bring forward legislation to give the government emergency powers to deal with coronavirus.

Hancock says an extra 700 people have been taken on to help on the 111 phone line.

Matt Hancock tells MPs UK death toll from coronavirus has now reached four

Matt Hancock, the health secretary, is responding to an urgent question on coronavirus now.

He says this morning there were 319 cases in the UK. And now there have been four deaths, he says.

The Muslim Council for Britain has put out a formal statement about Trevor Phillips’ suspension from Labour. (See 9.18am.) A spokesperson said:

Mr Phillips has made incendiary statements about Muslims that would be unacceptable for any other minority. Many of these sweeping generalisations are unfounded, wildly exaggerated and are familiar tropes taken up by the far right.

He has claimed Muslims do not report terrorism, despite the poll he cited showing Muslims report terrorism more than the general public. He likened placing a Christian girl into a foster care with a Muslim family as akin to “child abuse”; and further propagates the othering of Muslims, claiming Muslims are “not like us”, “see the world differently” and are a “nation within a nation”.

The impact of Mr Phillips claims from a privileged vantage point is dangerous, providing licence to far-right ideologues such as Tommy Robinson who have seized upon these remarks.

Mr Phillips would have us believe that he is a martyr for free speech and tolerance. But the fact remains that the deployment of these sweeping generalisations and tropes would not be acceptable for any other community.

We are not commenting on the internal processes of the Labour Party, its choices or prioritisation of this case versus others. We expect the Party to follow appropriate process and investigate its members over all allegations of Islamophobia, and all other types of racism.

No 10 says eventually it wants to stop having to use Huawei in telecoms network

The government is facing a possible revolt by Tory MPs tomorrow because some of them will be backing an amendment to telecoms legislation saying ministers should eliminate all Huawei technology from the UK’s mobile phone networks by the end of 2022. Earlier this year the government announced it would let the Chinese firm supply up to 35% of the new 5G network.

Asked about the possible vote (we don’t know yet whether the amendment will be called), the prime minister’s spokesman told journalists at the lobby briefing that the government would eventually like to stop having to use any Huawei technology in its telecoms network. He said:

We are clear-eyed about the challenged posed by Huawei, which is why are are banning them from sensitive and critical parts of the network and setting a strict 35% cap on market share. We will also keep that 35% market cap under review. We want to get to a position where we do not want to have to use a high-risk vendor [ie, Huawei] in our telecoms network.

And on the subject of the trade talks with the EU, Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister who is overseeing the “future partnership” stage of Brexit, has issued a parliamentary written statement about the first round of the talks that ended on Thursday last week. Here is an excerpt.

Discussions in some areas identified a degree of common understanding of the ground that future talks could cover. In other areas, notably fisheries, governance and dispute settlement, and the so-called “level playing field”, there were, as expected, significant differences.

The next negotiating round will take place on 18-20 March in London. The UK expects to table a number of legal texts, including a draft FTA, beforehand.

No 10 says EU chief wrong to claim UK has not decided what sort of Brexit it wants

During a press conference this morning Urusla von der Leyen, the European commission president, said the UK had to make up its mind about what it wanted from the talks on the post-Brexit trade relationship with the EU. She said:

We are aware that there are differences in the approach towards what scope should the future agreement have and what are - if I may say so - the rules of the game everybody has to abide to.

So it will be important that the United Kingdom makes up its mind; the closer they want to have access to the single market, the more they have to play by the rules that are the rules of the single market.

If this is not the UK’s choice, then of course they will be more distant and it will be more difficult for the UK to access the single market. So I think it’s up to the United Kingdom within the negotiations to think about the trade-offs they want to take into account.

Ursula von der Leyen speaking about Brexit during her press conference.

At the Downing Street lobby briefing the prime minister’s spokesman said that the Von der Leyen was wrong to say that the UK had not made up its mind. He said:

I think the UK has made up its mind very decisively, and has been very clear about what it wants from its future relationship with the EU. The UK’s position is the one which secured a significant majority for the prime minister in the December general election.

(The No 10 spokesman is right to say that the UK has made up its mind. As the government’s own document [pdf] setting out its position in the talks makes clear, it has resolved the “high alignment/low autonomy v low alignment/high autonomy” dilemma in favour of as much autonomy as possible. “Whatever happens, the government will not negotiate any arrangement in which the UK does not have control of its own laws and political life,” the document says. A more accurate criticism would be that the government has not yet been fully open with business and with the public about what the implications of this decision are.)

We’re getting an urgent question on coronavirus at 3.30pm.

There is a summary of all the main coronavirus lines from the No 10 lobby briefing here.

But the Mirror’s Dan Bloom sums it all up in a single tweet here.

Q: Is the government committed to retaining free school meals for the under 7s?

The spokesman says he is not aware of any suggestion that it isn’t. When it is put to him that this has been seen as a budget option, he says he has not seen that, and won’t comment on budget matters.

And that’s it. The briefing is over.

Q: Do you think the EU is listening to what the UK wants from the Brexit talks? Ursula von der Leyen said this morning the UK needed to make up its mind what it wants?

The spokesman says the UK has been very clear about what it wants.

Q: Does the government support the bid by Tory MPs to impose a deadline by which Huawei’s involvement in 5G should end?

The spokesman says, although the government has set a 35% cap on Huawei’s involvement, it wants to reduce this, so that the UK isn’t reliant on Huawei.

Q: Why did the PM say last year he had a plan for social care when it was clear from the letter sent out on Friday that there is no plan?

That is a reference to this letter.

The spokesman says the government is trying to find a consensus.

A significant amount of work has taken place on this, he says.

Q: Does the PM have a plan?

A significant amount of work has taken place, the spokesman says.

Q: This morning Oliver Dowden suggested cabin crew staff were getting training to spot symptoms. But the union that represents them denied this?

The spokesman says he thinks staff have been given advice on this.

Q: Will people brought back from the Grand Princess have to go into isolation?

The spokesman says the passengers themselves will be told first.

Q: Didn’t the CMO tell elderly people on Thursday to stay away from public places?

The spokesman says he does not have the CMO’s words to hand, but whatever he said would have been sensible, the spokesman says.

(The CMO actually said in future older people would be told to avoid public spaces.)

Q: Are elderly people being told they do not need to stay at home?

The spokesman says the government will be led by the evidence. If there is any further advice, it will be issued.

Q: What advice is being issued to them at the moment?

To wash their hands thoroughly, says the spokesman.

Q: How will the government identify people must vulnerable to the disease? And what about elderly people who may not be online?

The spokesman says the government is aware of this. He says advice will be issued in due course. This issue is being “actively worked on”, he says.

Q: Are there any plans to test people arriving in the UK for coronavirus?

The spokesman says the government has been issuing advice to people returning from specific areas. He says temperature checks on arrival are not effective. He says the government has an evidence-based, clinical approach to this.

The spokesman says the government has been very transparent so far in terms of publishing information. That will continue, he says.

Q: What did you mean when you said earlier that the virus will spread in a significant way?

The spokesman says the number of cases is increasing. We have had the first fatalities in the UK, and it is clear that it is spreading in country.

Q: Is there a meeting planned between the government and Premier League broadcasters?

The spokesman says DCMS held a meeting with a range of sporting bodies this morning.

But he says sporting events are not being cancelled at this point.

The spokesman says the environment department will be speaking to supermarket companies about what measures can be taken to ensure supplies to shops.

Q: Is the PM worried about the stock market crash?

The spokesman says the Bank of England has said it will take all steps necessary to protect the economy. He says the underlying fundamentals of the economy are strong.

Q: Would the PM urge people to stop panic buying?

The spokesman refers to what the PM said yesterday. He says the UK has a “resilient supply change”. The government will work to ensure that remains the case.

Q: What do you say to people who will be looking at what is happening in the UK and concluding the government is slow to act?

The spokesman says the government has been working on the basis of the best medical and scientific advice. It will continue to do that, he says.

Q: Does the PM have a message for people panic buying?

The spokesman says the PM commented on this yesterday. He says there was no need for people to do this.

Q: Will the local elections be delayed?

The spokesman says this is a matter for the Electoral Commission to advise on, but he says he is not aware of any plans for this.

The spokesman says the Foreign Office is working intensively with the US authorities on what can be done to bring home the 142 Britons on the Grand Princess cruise ship.

Q: Why did it take the Foreign Office so long to update its travel advice after the Italian quarantine decision?

The spokesman says the Foreign Office went through its normal decision making progress.

Q: Is the government considering stopping flights to the UK from the quarantined areas in Italy?

The spokesman says anyone returning to the UK from the quarantined areas of Italy should self-isolate, regardless of whether they are showing symptoms. And anyone returning to the UK from other parts of Italy should self-isolate if they develop symptoms.

Q: When is the government likely to announce further measures?

The spokesman says he does not want to pre-empt what happens. But he expects a SAGE meeting tomorrow, and a further Cobra meeting on Wednesday.

Q: Will you be giving out advice aimed at specific age groups?

The spokesman says, when the government does issue advice, it will come from the experts.

The prime minister’s spokesman is here.

He says the PM has been chairing Cobra. The chief medical officer and the chief scientific adviser were there. A range of measures to contain and delay the spread of coronavirus were discussed.

Later the PM will give a reading at the Commonwealth Day memorial service.

Greg Hands, the international trade minister, is visiting New York and Washington.

James Cleverly, the Foreign Office minister, is in Algiers. And Wendy Morton, another Foreign Office minister, is in Argentina.

The spokesman says Cobra was still going on as he left for the briefing, and so he says a full briefing on what was agreed will come later.

But he says at this stage the government is not calling for sporting events to be cancelled.

Q: Are we in the contain or delay phase?

The spokesman says we are in the contain phase, but it is accepted that the disease will spread at speed.

Q: When the CMO advises that we have moved to the delay phase, does he take the decision? Or is it ultimately up to the PM?

The spokesman says the PM has been clear that he will be led by the scientific advice.

He says it is important that any steps to delay the disease are introduced at the optimum time.

He says the government’s plan talks about the need to achieve the greatest possible impact on containing the spread of the disease, while minimising the social cost.

Q: Will there be a meeting of SAGE (scientific advisory group for emergencies) today?

The spokesman says it is more likely to come tomorrow.

Q: Does the government agree with the WHO director who says it is vital to takle the disease aggressively early on?

The spokesman says the government believes in following the scientific advice.

Downing Street lobby briefing

I’m at 9 Downing Street for the regular morning lobby briefing, which is due to start at 12.30pm. The prime minister’s spokesman will be briefing on normal government business, but also on this morning’s meeting of the Cobra emergency committee, chaired by Boris Johnson, to discuss coronavirus.

The embargo on the briefing is normally lifted soon after it starts.

One of the main aims of Boris Johnson’s government is to “level up” Britain and the budget on Wednesday may by the first big chance for the government to show what it actually means (or it would have been, if circumstances had not evolved to mean that it will largely become a coronavirus rescue plan instead).

But what does “levelling up” actually mean, and how will anyone be able to tell in 2024 whether it has been accomplished successfully. In his interview with Andrew Marr (pdf) yesterday Rishi Sunak, the new chancellor, was unable to give a very good answer. He said that levelling up was about “spreading opportunity” (something to which almost every government in the democratic age has been committed). When Marr pressed him on this again, and asked how he would measure “levelling up”, Sunak replied:

You’ll be able to, of course, measure it in the stats of income growth and everything else. You’ll be able to measure it in whether we’re making our investments in infrastructure as we’ve said ... But, as I say, it’s about a feeling that people have that where they happen to be born, where they happen to grow up is not going to be the determinant of how well they do in life. It’s because, wherever they are, we’ve provided them with the opportunities. Whether it’s through education, whether it’s through skills, whether it’s through a better bus connection that gets them to a better job, we’re doing all of that, and that’s meant that their life is better off.

This morning the Institute for Fiscal Studies has published a useful briefing note looking at what “levelling up” could mean in practice. It could mean raising regional investment spending to the level in London, but this would cost a fortune, it says. Ben Zaranko, who wrote the briefing, explains:

Currently, investment spending per head is higher in London than anywhere else in the country: £1,456 per head in London, versus an average of £891 in the rest of the UK, and just £621 per head in the East Midlands.. Transport, which will be of particular importance for productivity growth, is a key driver of differences in spending across the country: at £653 per head, transport investment is 2.5 times higher in London than the average £260 per head in the rest of the UK.

Rewriting the rules that govern which projects receive funding to place greater weight on regional equity could be one way of rebalancing government investment away from London and the South East, and towards other parts of the country. ‘Levelling up’ in this respect could come with a hefty price tag: raising transport investment per head across the UK to the current London level would mean spending an extra £19bn per year.

Zaranko says “levelling up” could also be taken to mean ensuring every region in the UK gets the same total spending per head. But this would not benefit the regions that need it most, he says, because it would mean increasing spending in areas like the south east of England that need it less than other regions.

Updated

For an alternative view, this is what the Labour MP Khalid Mahmood says about Trevor Phillips’s suspension from the party in a foreword to the Policy Exchange report published this morning. (See 10.01am and 11.10am.) Mahmood says:

It was with no small measure of astonishment that I learnt that my own party, the Labour party, had initiated proceedings against Trevor Phillips on grounds of ‘racism’ and ‘Islamophobia’. The charges are so outlandish as to bring disrepute on all involved in making them; and I fear they further add to the sense that we, as a party, have badly lost our way.

Mahmood links what has happened to Phillips to his opposition to the definition of Islamophobia drawn up by the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on British Muslims. Mahmood, a member of that APPG, says he also thinks its definition of Islamophobia is not fit for purpose.

For the record, here is the APPG’s definition.

Islamophobia is rooted in racism and is a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.

And these are from Sayeeda Warsi, the former Conservative party chair, who is a longstanding campaigner against Islamophobia in her own party and elsewhere. She does not mention Trevor Phillips by name, but it is fairly obvious that her comments are aimed at him.

These are from Miqdaad Versi, a spokesman for the Muslim Council of Britain, on the Trevor Phillips’ suspension.

Details of Labour's Islamophobia charges against Trevor Phillips - and Phillips' response

The Policy Exchange report (pdf) includes the text of the letter sent to Trevor Phillips by Labour’s governance and legal unit explaining why he has been suspended for alleged Islamophobia. The letter is quite long and detailed, but it accuses Phillips of breaking four specific party rules, all relating to Islamophobia or prejudice against race and religion generally. To justify these allegations, the letter cites numerous alleged offensive passages, which come from five sources: a transcript of a Tory conference fringe event on Islamophobia, an article for Unherd, a Mail report of what Phillips said at Policy Exchange event, a report quoting what Phillips said in an article in the Sunday Times, and a report (pdf) Phillips wrote for the Civitas thinktank four years ago, called Race and Faith: The Deafening Silence.

Some of the alleged offensive remarks are very particular: a reference to Enoch Powell’s Rivers of Blood speech, which Phillips says is taken out of context, and a joke by Phillips about being nominated for “Islamophobe of the year” by an Iranian human rights body. But most of the complaints relate to two sorts of comment that Phillips has been making in recent years.

First, Phillips has argued that Muslims see the word differently and that they have not integrated as much as other immigrant communities. Here are two of the quotes in the Labour letter cited as evidence of Phillips breaking party rules. The first is about him, and the second is from the Civitas report he wrote.

Muslim communities are not like others in Britain and the country should accept they will never integrate, the former head of the equalities watchdog has claimed. Trevor Phillips, the former chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said it was disrespectful to assume that Muslim communities would change. He told a meeting at the Policy Exchange think tank in Westminster on Monday that Muslims ‘see the world differently from the rest of us’.

At a recent conference of Muslim scholars, I had the privilege of addressing a hundred or so people at a leading British university. Most of the audience were Muslims themselves. The event took place just a few days before Remembrance Sunday. I noted that just three people in the room displayed a poppy, myself, a (white) journalist and one Muslim attendee. Raising the point, I could see the incomprehension on the faces of those without poppies; they weren’t meaning to offend, but as a group, they couldn’t see why they should wear what – I imagine – they think of as a symbol of war. The same day, I visited an industrial site – where many immigrants, mostly African and Eastern Europeans, were working. Poppies were everywhere. The norms in these two places were wholly different. One group had clearly adapted to the mainstream; the other had not.

Second, Phillips has highlighted the involvement of Muslim men in child grooming scandals in England, and in harassment incidents in Germany. Here is one of the relevant quotes cited by Labour in the letter as evidence of Phillips breaking party rules. It is from the Civitas report he wrote:

But the most sensitive cause of conflict in recent years has been the collision between majority norms and the behaviours of some Muslim groups. In particular, the exposure of systematic and longstanding abuse by men, mostly of Pakistani Muslim origin in the North of England.

In his response Phillips says the Labour letter came as “something of a surprise”. He says that he will need more time to respond in detail, he suggests come of the comments have been taken out of context, and he asks why he is being disciplined for comments that in some cases were made several years ago. And he stresses his own background as someone who has confronted Islamphobia. He asks:

Did the disputes committee know of, or consider the specific context of the allegations? For example, did the committee discuss the likelihood that a party member of over a quarter of a century’s standing, who is himself a person of colour, and whose family heritage includes almost a thousand years of adherence to Islam, would either deliberately or accidentally make any statements that are racist or Islamophobic?

Were the committee provided with any information as to the commissioning and publication of the Runnymede Trust’s 1997 report on Islamophobia; the Parekh Report of 2000 which called for incitement to racial hatred to be extended to protect Muslims; or the successful efforts by the Commission for Racial Equality to bring about the passage (by the last Labour government) of the Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006, protecting Muslims inter alia from acts of incitement? I was chair of each organisation in the relevant periods and personally commissioned and launched the two reports referred to.

Thinktank publishes letter from Labour to Trevor Phillips explaining his suspension

Policy Exchange, a rightwing thinktank, has this morning published a report (pdf) on the Labour party accusations against Trevor Phillips called The Trial: the strange case of Trevor Phillips. You can get the gist of it from the subtitle, which is “How the accusation of Islamophobia is used to stifle free speech”.

Phillips has said he is not allowed under Labour rules to disclose the exact nature of the charges against him, but miraculously Policy Exchange has managed to get hold a copy of the party’s letter to Phillips explaining why he has been suspended. It is published in the report as an appendix, along with Phillips’ response.

I will post a summary soon.

Updated

Here is Trevor Phillips’ interview with the Today programme where he was asked about comments he has made that triggered the Labour party’s decision to suspend him for alleged Islamophobia.

Our write-up of the interview is here.

George Osborne, the former Conservative chancellor who now edits the Evening Standard in London, told Radio 4’s Today programme this morning that if he were delivering the budget on Wednesday, he would focus on providing short-term help for businesses and individuals affected by the coronavirus outbreak.

If I was chancellor, and I’m sure Rishi [Sunak] is thinking like this, I don’t want some complicated scheme that is going to be working in six months’ time.

I need to use the tools that are available to me right now to help people who are unable to work because their business has shut or they are self-isolating or they have got the virus, and to help those small and medium-sized businesses that will have very limited cash reserves and therefore could go into bankruptcy.

It is a short-term help. It is not like we are going to have 10 years of this.

Osborne also hinted that he would like to be writing the budget speech himself, because he also used the interview to road test exactly the sort of cheesy metaphor he used to deploy himself when he was chancellor. He said:

If I was chancellor of the exchequer, I would make this a Budget for the coronavirus, I would do everything I could to vaccinate the economy against what is going to happen.

If we can’t vaccinate people against what is going to happen, I would provide the cash for businesses and individuals that don’t have it at the moment because of the impact of the virus, and try and provide that immunity to the economy going forward.

Trevor Phillips says his suspension by Labour suggests party turning into 'brutish, authoritarian cult'

Good morning. On Thursday last week Boris Johnson told ITV that “the most important message at this stage, as we start to see [coronavirus] spread, is ... as far as possible, it should be business as usual for the overwhelming majority of people in this country”. Journalists who make bold assertions are often taught to include some “cover” in the remarks, some qualification that protects them against the possibility of being 100% wrong, and for Johnson the three words “at this stage” proved very useful. On Thursday morning it may have been, for most people, business as usual. But no one would say that four days later. As ever, Jack Blanchard has a good summary of where we are in his London Playbook briefing.

The oil price crashed 30% when markets opened this morning … as Asian stock markets and US bond yields tumbled dramatically … after Italy sealed off 16m people from the outside world … and France banned all large gatherings of people … and Germany recommended doing the same … while the number of coronavirus cases in Britain leapt by more than 30% in one day … and a third Briton died after contracting the virus … and we now have Tesco rationing the sale of basic groceries … and it’s still only 7 am on Monday morning. Goodness knows what else this week will bring.

We are covering the main coronavirus developments on a special coronavirus outbreak live blog which Frances Perraudin is writing this morning. You can read it here.

And Graeme Wearden is covering this morning’s most dramatic development - the stock market has crashed - on his business live blog.

I will be covering some Westminster coronavirus developments here, but our lead coverage on this will be on the coronavirus blog, and so I will be looking at other stories too.

Of which the most remarkable is - Labour’s decision to suspend Trevor Phillips, a former head of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, for alleged Islamophobia. My colleagues Peter Walker and Sam Gelder have the story here.

Phillips has written about his suspension in an article (paywall) for the Times. He says that he is perplexed by the charge that he is guilty of Islamophobia (a term that he says he actually introduced into British politics) and he says his suspension could be evidence of Labour turning into “a brutish, authoritarian cult”. He says:

So what accounts for this extraordinary turn of events? Some will see it as payback by Corbynistas for public criticisms I made of the leadership’s failure to tackle antisemitism in the party. Another possibility is that it’s an attempt to scare the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which I used to lead and which is investigating Labour’s handling of antisemitism. Weaponising Islamophobia to attack political opponents may seem like clever tactics but trying to intimidate a legally independent organisation is pure political gangsterism. Perhaps someone in Labour HQ has been reading up on the Inquisition’s methods; in 1578, one official defined its purpose thus: “That others may become terrified and weaned away from the evils they would commit.”

I accept that I may not share all the views of Labour’s current leader or even of the majority of members. But I have never belonged to any other party and I have stuck by it through thick and thin. If this is how Labour treats its own family, how might it treat its real opponents if it ever gains power again? It would be a tragedy if, at the very moment we most need a robust and effective opposition, our nation had to endure the spectacle of a great party collapsing into a brutish, authoritarian cult.

Here is the agenda for the day.

11am: Boris Johnson chairs a meeting of the government’s Cobra emergency committee to discuss the coronavirus outbreak.

11am: John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, gives a speech ahead of the budget on Wednesday.

12.30pm: Downing Street lobby briefing.

12.30pm: Executives from Google give evidence to the Lords democracy and digital technologies committee.

2.30pm: Thérèse Coffey, the work and pensions secretary, takes questions in the Commons.

As usual, I will be covering breaking political news as it happens, as well as bringing you the best reaction, comment and analysis from the web. I plan to post a summary when I wrap up.

You can read all the latest Guardian politics articles here. Here is the Politico Europe roundup of this morning’s political news. And here is the PoliticsHome list of today’s top 10 must-reads.

If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter, I’m on @AndrewSparrow.

I try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.

If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter.

Updated

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