Early evening summary
- Boris Johnson has said that he expects life to be “much more close to normal” by Easter and that by the summer people will be able to attend big events like weddings. He made the prediction in his latest “People’s PMQs”, when he was responding to questions from a woman with a wedding planning business who said she had lost all her bookings this year. Johnson said a combination of the vaccine, plus mass testing, would make a difference by Easter. He said there would come a point where “life [will be] much more close to normal, which we think will be by Easter”. And by the summer the wedding industry would be alright, he said.
It’s my strong hope and belief that by the summer, one way or the other, whether by vaccination, which I hope and believe we will have delivered by Easter, or by lateral flow testing, we will be in a different world. My hope is that by summer it really will be a different world for the weddings and events industry.
- Johnson has said he wishes he had had a better understanding of asymptomatic Covid transmission at the start of the pandemic. Asked during the Q&A about his biggest regrets, he replied:
The truth is in this country we didn’t have that experience that they have in some far eastern countries, of Sars. They had a history of knowing about these very difficult respiratory infections, which we didn’t have. There will be a lot of work to be done at looking at the lessons to be learned.
I think the one thing that I wish I understood in the early days … I just wish we’d realised how much the disease could be transmitted without symptoms. If we’d known that single fact it would have made a big difference to our early response. We do know it now. And that’s why testing is so crucial.
During the Q&A he also hinted that the government would be using tax cuts and deregulation to regenerate the economy next year.
That’s all from me for today. But our coverage continues on our global coronavirus live blog. It’s here.
Updated
From the Daily Mirror’s Pippa Crerar
At Boris Johnson's #PeoplesPMQs:
— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) December 3, 2020
- wishes he'd known how much virus spreads asymptomatically
- teachers next in line for vaccine after high risk
- tax cuts for business next year
- weddings can take place next summer (but avoids question about his own)
Updated
Johnson tells the final caller that the government is doing its best to explain why particular areas are in particular tiers.
And he ends by saying he expects to be doing a lot more of these.
Johnson says that by next summer he expects people will be able to attend big events like weddings
Q: What will you do for the wedding industry? Will you allow more people to attend weddings?
Johnson says he does want to help. He knows this is a massive industry.
He says lateral flow testing (rapid result testing) has huge possibilities. He says he is not saying now that people can get a negative test and then go to a big wedding reception that day. But he suggests that at some point in the future that might be possible. Mass testing, combined with the number of people being vaccinated, will make a difference “before Easter”, he says. He says it could allow bigger weddings to go ahead.
Q: The furlough does not help the wedding planning industry. We still have to pay our overheads. People are just cancelling. We have lost 100% of our bookings this year, and 30% of our bookings for next year.
Johnson says he thinks that, by the summer, things will be alright. That is his “strong hope and belief”, he says.
My hope is that by summer it really will be a different world for the wedding and events industry.
He hopes people will be “getting hitched” in the normal way by then.
Q: I had to cancel my wedding. And you are supposed to be getting married too?
Johnson said he did not want to mention that.
Updated
Q: What will you do to protect the economy?
Johnson says he knows had bad it has been for businesses, particularly in hospitality. But he says he is sure that businesses will bounce back very strongly next year. And the chancellor is looking at what can be done with taxation and regulation to make this country the best place to start a business.
And there are advantages to coming out of the EU, like free ports, he says. The government will be looking at all these things.
But the best thing for business now is to get the virus under control. That will spread confidence. He goes on:
An ounce of confidence is worth a tonne of Rishi’s money.
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Johnson says he wishes he had understood extent of asymptomatic transmission better at start of pandemic
Q: Can you name one thing you wish you had done different in your response to Covid? And how could we have been better prepared?
Johnson says that is a good question. You can think of all sorts of ways we could have been better prepared, he says. But he says the UK did not have the experience of dealing with respiratory illnesses like Sars that Asian countries did.
He says he wishes, in the early days, he had known how much asymptomatic transmission there was. He says that would have highlighted the importance of testing.
There are other things that people will want to go over, he says.
Updated
Q: What is the rationale for allowing mass attendance at outdoor events? Won’t they become superspreader events?
Johnson says that is a good question. They took a lot of advice on this. The experts were convinced there was a significantly reduced risk of transmission if people followed the rules, he says.
Johnson says he does not know what the questions are. They have been selected by YouGov.
Q: Will teachers and support staff also get priority for the vaccine?
Johnson says care home workers, the elderly and NHS staff are getting priority.
Clinically vulnerable will also get priority.
The joint committee on vaccination and immunisation has done a “pretty sensible” list.
With reference to teachers, he says they will get priority if they are vulnerable.
But schools already get access to rapid flow tests, which should enable them to reduce the spread of the disease, he says.
He says the government wants to reduce the problem in schools.
There are tens of millions available to fund this, he says.
(That was a very long-winded way of saying no, teachers will not get priority.)
Updated
Johnson starts by saying there has been great news this week about the vaccine. And he reminds people the new tier system has come into force in England.
Boris Johnson answers 'People's PMQs'
Downing Street is about to broadcast Boris Johnson’s latest “People’s PMQs” on its Facebook page.
The all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on coronavirus has today published a 91-page interim report (pdf) from its inquiry into the pandemic. It claims to be “the biggest review to date of the UK’s response to coronavirus”, and it makes 44 recommendatons, including calling for test and trace to be localised, better support for those in social care and a registry of people living with long Covid.
APPGs operate like parliamentary select committees – they take evidence from experts and publish reports – but they are essentially self-appointed, and government departments tend to take them less seriously. The coronavirus APPG has the Lib Dem MP Layla Moran as its chair, and the Green MP Caroline Lucas as its vice-chair, and another 56 MPs or peers as members.
In her foreword to the report, Moran said:
Our topmost recommendation is that we urgently need a UK-wide exit strategy that acknowledges that by saving people’s lives, we in turn safeguard their jobs and the economy. We challenge the UK government’s core argument that there is a ‘balance’ to be found between the health and wealth of the UK, and instead advocate an approach closer to those nations that have successfully ‘beaten’ the virus.
This includes strong initial restrictions to get case numbers extremely low everywhere, a TTI [test, trace and isolate] system that is locally led and nationally resourced that pays people to stay at home if they need to, and aggressive testing at the borders, turning our island geography into a powerful advantage.
We are concerned that the government’s approach so far has not worked and has left the UK mourning among the highest number of lives lost to the pandemic, while at the same time bracing for one of the deepest recessions in its aftermath. The vaccine may be around the corner, and that is brilliant news, but the logistical challenges and uncertainty make it almost certain that we have months, if not years, of aftermath to contend with.
Updated
NHS England has today recorded 183 coronavirus hospital deaths. The details are here.
That is down from 372 yesterday and 351 a week ago today.
Updated
UK's official death toll exceeds 60,000
The UK government’s official Covid death toll has exceeded 60,000 just three weeks after it reached the 50,000 milestone, with more deaths anticipated in the coming winter months.
The official death toll now stands at 60,113, a figure which counts known deaths among those who have died within 28 days of testing positive for the virus. The UK reported 414 new deaths on Thursday and another 14,879 cases.
Counting all deaths that mention coronavirus on the death certificate, the UK death toll on Tuesday passed 75,000.
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Dorset’s police and crime commissioner has said he worries about the potential for civil unrest and a loss of public trust in policing if pandemic restrictions continue.
Speaking on a recent podcast, Martyn Underhill said he disagreed with the effective ban on public protest implemented as part of the last lockdown, describing it as a “purely political decision”. Speaking on a panel for the Cityforum policing podcast, Underhill, a former police officer who was elected PCC as an independent candidate, said:
I worry about the relationship with the public over the role of policing in enforcing Covid regulations – never forgetting we’re a society that polices by consent.
And actually the 90% non-payment of Covid fixed-penalty tickets nationally is a stark reminder that some sections of the public are fiercely opposed to Covid rules and enforcement, and I do worry about civil unrest if the pandemic continues unabated.
This pandemic, I have to say, takes me back to the 80s and the miners’ strike, in that policing is being expected to enforce not just the rule of law, but also the rule of the government. For example, the current ban on public protest is a purely political decision that some senior leaders disagree with, including me.
But police leaders have to enforce it because it’s now law. And as soon as policing starts enforcing the will of the government, rather than the law of the government, I worry about civil unrest.
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Businesses in Liverpool could offer discounts to shoppers who show negative coronavirus test results as part of a new initiative, PA Media reports.
Rates of the virus have fallen dramatically in the city since a pilot scheme offering tests to people without symptoms got under way in November. Now, businesses in Liverpool, which is in tier 2, are being asked to put forward discounts or offers to anyone who can show they have had tested negatively in the past 24 hours.It is hoped the incentive will encourage people to get regular tests and allow people to enjoy shops and restaurants safely during December.
As part of the scheme – a partnership between Marketing Liverpool, the city region’s destination marketing organisation, Liverpool BID Company, a business organisation, and Liverpool One, a shopping centre – venues and customers would still need to follow restrictions and guidelines on social distancing.
Chris Brown, the director of Marketing Liverpool, said:
The mass testing pilot ran for almost a month and during that time we’ve seen people who live, work and study in Liverpool get regular tests in order for us to keep the virus at bay.
Regular testing is crucial if we want to keep Liverpool in tier 2 in the run-up to Christmas and for businesses across the city to reopen with confidence.
An incentive scheme such as this benefits everyone, it allows those with a negative lateral flow test result to safely enjoy our shops, restaurants and visitor attractions during December whilst bringing much-needed footfall back into our venues.
In a guide (pdf) published on Monday setting out how local authorities in England could use mass testing (or community testing, as the government now calls it), and what the advantages might be, the government said discount schemes could be an incentive to encourage people to get tested.
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Jeane Freeman, the Scottish health secretary, has told MSPs that the security service MI5 has informed ministers that the locations of freezers being used to store vaccines should remain secret.
In a statement to MSPs this afternoon, Freeman said they were not going to name the refrigeration sites but confirmed facilities had been found in every Scottish health board area, including thre main island groups of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.
She said the NHS would also use mobile vaccination vans for remoter areas or populations unable to easily travel to vaccination centres.
Earlier this week Police Scotland refused to confirm or deny whether it would provide escorts for vaccine transports, but said it had offered advice to health boards.
“The storage and control of medication is a matter for individual health authorities, however we will work with all partners to offer advice and support where required,” a spokeswoman said.
Freeman also significantly revised her original prediction in November that Scotland’s vaccination programme would be complete by spring next year.
She told MSPs they expected to finish the first phase of vaccinations, which covers the vulnerable, older people and frontline health and care workers, by spring. “The rest of the adult population will follow as quickly as possible,” she said.
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Covid rates in England falling among all age groups and in all regions, PHE report says
Public Health England has published its latest weekly Covid surveillance report (pdf).
It show that case rates for coronavirus are continuing to fall across all age groups, and in all regions of England.
The highest rate was in the 40 to 49 age group, which had 190.3 cases per 100,000 people last week.
Rates fell most in the 20 to 29 age group, where there were 171.9 cases per 100,000 last week, compared with 240.9 in the previous week.
In the regions, rates fell most in the north-east, where there were 181.7 cases per 100,000 people last week, compared with 286.6 the week before.
This week's #COVID19 surveillance report shows that case rates continue to fall across all age groups, with the biggest drop in those aged 20-29.
— Public Health England (@PHE_uk) December 3, 2020
See the data for yourself here: https://t.co/8dYt9zEVk9 pic.twitter.com/aTeYv5ZfSJ
Our weekly #COVID19 surveillance report also shows that case rates continue to fall across all regions in England.
— Public Health England (@PHE_uk) December 3, 2020
You can find the report here: https://t.co/8dYt9zEVk9 pic.twitter.com/gFCVLt0ena
Covid hospital admissions are also falling. Last week there were 14.01 hospital admissions per 100,000 people, compared with 16.25 per 100,000 in the previous week.
Admissions have been falling in all regions apart from the south-east, where there has been a slight increase. The largest decrease was in the north-east.
The overall hospital admission rate for #COVID19 also continues to fall.
— Public Health England (@PHE_uk) December 3, 2020
Hospital admissions remain highest in those aged 85 and over.
Have a look at our weekly surveillance report here: https://t.co/8dYt9zEVk9 pic.twitter.com/hRTxJhcrjv
Hospital admission rates for #COVID19 continue to be highest in the North East.
— Public Health England (@PHE_uk) December 3, 2020
See the data in our weekly surveillance report: https://t.co/8dYt9zEVk9 pic.twitter.com/whus5N7gen
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'Not a football competition' - European commission rebukes British ministers boasting about rapid vaccine approval
The European commission has suggested that British ministers, such as Gavin Williamson (see 10.32am), who have been boasting about how quickly the UK has been able to approve a coronavirus vaccine compared with other countries have been trivialising the issue. At a briefing, the commission’s spokesman, Eric Mamer, said:
We are definitely not in the game of comparing regulators across countries, nor on commenting on claims as to who is better. This is not a football competition, we are talking about the life and health of people.
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On the subject of whether girls should be allowed to go to Eton (see 12.43pm), Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the Commons, told MPs earlier that he disagreed with Gavin Williamson and did not want to see his old school go co-ed. (That’s hardly a surprise, admittedly.) “Much though I might like my own daughter to go there, I think it works very well as it is, thank you very much,” he told MPs.
The new travel rules for Wales (see 1.22pm) have been criticised by the Conservatives, who claim they will mean people will head across the border for a drink in England after Welsh pubs are banned from serving alcohol on Friday evening.
Darren Millar, the shadow Covid recovery minister in Wales, said:
While any lifting of travel restrictions between Wales and England is to be welcomed, there can be no doubt that this news will rub salt in the wounds of the Welsh hospitality industry.
With Welsh pubs, cafes and restaurants being banned from selling alcohol on their premises from 6pm tomorrow, many of their customers will be taking their custom and cash across the border to enjoy a tipple with a meal in England instead.
The Welsh Labour-led government must rethink its new rules, engage with leaders in the hospitality industry and adopt a more targeted approach to intervention that keeps the Welsh pound in Wales, and attracts the English pound into Welsh businesses too, especially in the run up to Christmas.
Under the new rules Welsh people are not allowed to travel to tier 3 areas in England but only “strongly advised” not to travel to tier 1 and 2 areas.
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Northern Ireland executive rules out banning people from venues or activities if they haven't had vaccine
On Monday Nadhim Zahawi, the new vaccination minister, suggested that venues like bars and cinemas might start requiring customers to show that they have had the coronavirus vaccine. Zahawi implied that the government would approve of this, although the following day Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, insisted that this was not government policy.
In Northern Ireland Robin Swann, the health minister, has said that the executive there has ruled out people being allowed special access to places just because they have had the vaccine. Giving evidence to the assembly’s health committee, he said that Arlene Foster, the first minister, and Michelle O’Neill, the deputy first minister agree with him that people without vaccinations could not be prevented from doing things those with the jab could do. He said:
In regard to linking the uptake of the vaccine to some sort of access to recreation or even getting into economic or retail settings and things like that, it is not the intention, nor will be it be the policy intention, of either my department or the executive.
But Swann also said the executive could not control what international companies did. Referring to the airline Qantas, which has said international travellers will need to prove they have received a Covid-19 jab before boarding a flight, he said:
We would have no control or influence over those international companies. I think there’s actually a significant airline who are now indicating that pre-indication or pre-certification that you’ve had the vaccine will be a condition to fly on.
Whether it is taken up by others outside our remit or our jurisdiction, it’s not something that we will be taking forward as any sort of policy intent.
People in Wales to be banned from visiting high-Covid areas in the rest of UK
Travel between Wales and areas of the UK with high rates of coronavirus will not be allowed from 6pm tomorrow, the Welsh first minister, Mark Drakeford, has said.
Wales’s coronavirus regulations will be amended to prohibit travel to and from tier 3 areas in England; level 3 and 4 areas in Scotland and the whole of Northern Ireland.
New travel guidance will be issued “strongly advising” people in Wales not to travel to other parts of the UK with lower levels of coronavirus – tier 1 and 2 areas in England or level 1 and 2 areas in Scotland – to help control the spread of the virus.
The Welsh government said people from Wales would be required to follow any legal restrictions, including relating to travel, which were in place in other parts of the UK.
Drakeford said:
There will be no restrictions on travel within Wales but we need to have some restrictions on travel across the border to those parts of the UK where infection rates are high to prevent the spread of coronavirus.
We are also advising people in Wales not to travel into those parts of England and Scotland where the infection rate is lower, to help prevent them taking coronavirus with them.
Coronavirus doesn’t respect borders – we all have a part to play in keeping Wales and the UK safe. Please think carefully about where you are going and what you are doing. This virus thrives wherever we come together with others.
The Welsh government is due to give further details, including of any possible exemptions for emergency travel, later. The travel restrictions are likely to remain in place until at least January 2021 but will be kept under constant review.
Updated
Yesterday, Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the Commons, claimed that the UK was only able to approve the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine quickly because of Brexit. This is untrue.
We could only approve this vaccine so quickly because we have left the EU. Last month we changed the regulations so a vaccine did not need EU approval which is slower. https://t.co/y2Az7okPdx
— Jacob Rees-Mogg (@Jacob_Rees_Mogg) December 2, 2020
During questions on the business statement in the Commons, Labour’s Valerie Vaz, the shadow leader of the house, asked Rees-Mogg to take back this comment because it was wrong. In response, Rees-Mogg defended Brexit – but this time he avoided crediting it with responsibility for the vaccine announcement. He told MPs:
The UK should be really proud that our regulator got in first and we notice that the European regulator is a bit sniffy about it, wishes we hadn’t done it, and that Germany and France and other European countries haven’t managed to do the same thing.
We have, we’re leading, draw your own conclusions, as I’m sure the British public will.
We are now free of the dead hand of the European Union and will be even more free from that on January 1. It is a huge British success of which we should be proud and pleased.
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Sir Keir Starmer has urged the government do to more to help pupils who have missed schooling this year. Speaking to broadcasters on a visit to Plymouth, and responding to the government announcement about plans to make exams in England easier next summer to compensate for the disruption caused by coronavirus, he said:
We can’t cancel exams – we had a complete fiasco this summer over exams and we can’t go down that route again because it would be so unfair.
We’ve been calling on the government for months now to delay the exams because of the obvious problems for children and young people. They finally got round to doing it but they need to go further because the attainment gap has got bigger during the course of this pandemic as people have been off school.
The government needs to put extra support in to make sure that those children who’ve lost out in these months have a fair opportunity when they get to those exams. That’s where the catch-up and support for the children who have fallen further behind is so important.
That attainment gap has been there for a long time, which is a real problem and a failure of this government, but it’s got worse during the pandemic because children have not been able to learn in the same way from home and haven’t necessarily had the same support.
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Nicola Sturgeon said that she hoped the coronavirus vaccine would be available to care homes “very soon” as she was pressed on the Scottish government’s mass vaccination programme by Scottish Conservatives Holyrood leader Ruth Davidson at FMQs.
Sturgeon said she took part in a four-nations call on the subject yesterday evening and assured MSPs that “we will use the vaccine as soon as possible when available and as closely as possible in line with order of priority”. But she added:
This is the bit I and the prime minister and other first ministers can’t be definitive about right now ... there is still some uncertainty given the particular characteristics of the Pfizer vaccine [the need for refrigeration at very low temperatures] about the extent to which it will be moveable.
She stressed that the rollout of the programme depended on a number of other vaccines receiving approval.
The Scottish Labour leader, Richard Leonard, invited MSPs to join him in sending condolences to the family of the trailblazing former Labour MP Maria Fyfe, who died this morning. Fyfe was a shadow minister for women and frontbench spokesperson on Scotland at Westminster, and campaigned for 50/50 representation as the Holyrood parliament was established.
Our comrade Maria Fyfe passed away this morning.
— Glasgow Maryhill and Springburn Labour Party (@MSLabour) December 3, 2020
Maria was MP for Maryhill from 1987-2001, played a crucial role in delivering devolution and remained an active CLP member all her life, including as our VC.
We have lost a giant of our movement. Our thoughts are with her family. pic.twitter.com/4F1QvegkHw
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In an interview this morning Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, said that he thought Eton should start admitting girls. At the Downing Street lobby briefing the prime minister’s spokesman would not say if Boris Johnson thought his time at Eton would have been enhanced by having girls in the classroom (the spokesman said he had not discussed it with him), but he said the government believed single sex schools were an important part of the education system.
Boris Johnson is due to hold one of his “People’s PMQs” Facebook Q&As later this afternoon, Downing Street has announced.
We have not had one of these for a while - although given how pointless they were when he was doing them at the start of the year, that’s something of a blessing. We’ll find out later if he has found a way of making the format more productive.
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Lord Maginnis, the former Ulster Unionist MP, should be suspended from the House of Lords for at least 18 months for bullying and harassment of three MPs and a security guard, the peers’ standards watchdog has recommended. As PA Media reports, the recommendation from the Lords conduct committee follows an investigation into the peer’s treatment of a parliamentary security officer and MPs Hannah Bardell, Luke Pollard and Toby Perkins.
Maginnis was investigated after being “verbally abusive” to security officer Christian Bombolo when asked to show his parliamentary pass in January. Bardell witnessed the incident and complained that when she attempted to intervene she was treated “rudely and aggressively” by Maginnis, who later used “homophobic and derogatory language about her” in comments to the media.
The report said:
In his oral appeal Lord Maginnis showed very little insight into the impact of his behaviour on the complainants, and no remorse for the upset he had caused. To the contrary, he portrayed himself as a victim of a conspiracy by people who disapproved of his views and insisted that all his conduct had been provoked.
Peers will have to approve the report’s recommendation before it takes effect.
Shapps announces plans to minimise travel disruption over Christmas
Grant Shapps, the transport secretary, has announced plans to minimise travel disruption over Christmas, including clearing roadworks from 778 miles of roads and postponing rail engineering works. The details are here.
We’re lifting 778 miles of roadworks 🚧 altering rail upgrades to allow extra services🚆and waiving admin fees to help passengers travel safely at Christmas.
— Rt Hon Grant Shapps MP (@grantshapps) December 3, 2020
Plan early, book ahead, and read more here 👇https://t.co/m08gK5Tvbc pic.twitter.com/YvmVZDzJGo
Test and trace achieves 'notable' increase in reaching close contacts - by excluding under-18s from figures
NHS test and trace has changed the way it deals with people under the age of 18 who have been in close contact with someone testing positive, today’s report reveals. Instead of contacting them individually, a parent or guardian in the household is asked to confirm they have told the child to self-isolate, and if they have done so the child is recorded as having been reached.
As today’s report (pdf) reveals, this means that the headline figures for the proportion of close contacts who have been reached are significantly higher than they would have been otherwise. The report says:
Between 19 November and 25 November, 235,787 close contacts not managed by local HTPs [health protection teams - they only deal with a very small proportion of these cases] were identified of which 168,191 (71.3%) were reached and told to self-isolate. This is notable increase compared with 58.8% the previous week likely due to the change in contacting household contacts under 18.
The service has a target of reaching 80% of close contacts of people who have tested positive for coronavirus.
The NASUWT teaching union has said that Gavin Williamson’s statement about arrangements for exams in England next summer has left “many important questions unanswered”. (See 10.42am.) In a statement Patrick Roach, the union’s general secretary, said:
The NASUWT has never underestimated the scale of this challenge or the problems that disruption to the normal operation of exams creates. However, the government’s delay in bringing forward plans for next summer’s examinations and qualifications has caused unnecessary anxiety, stress and workload pressures for both teachers and pupils.
Photograph: Tolga Akmen/AFP/Getty Images
Test-and-trace figures confirm sharp fall in number of positive cases
The number of people testing positive for coronavirus in England has decreased by the largest amount since cases began to rise steeply from the end of August, according to the latest NHS test-and-trace performance figures.
The figures, published by the Department of Health and Social Care, show that 110,620 people tested positive for coronavirus in the week ending 25 November, a decrease of 28% compared with the previous week. These figures indicate that the spread of the virus is decreasing significantly, as the week before showed a decrease of 8.7% in terms of positive coronavirus tests.
There was an increase in the number of contacts reached by test and trace. When taking into account all contacts identified of a person testing positive for coronavirus, 72.5% were reached, compared with the previous week where only 60.3% of all contacts identified were reached.
There continued to be a reduction in the proportion of coronavirus tests being positive this week, at 6.7%. This is compared with 8.8% the previous week, and 9.6% the week before that.
Updated
One of the reasons Prof Jonathan Van-Tam is so popular as a scientific communicator is because he’s a master of the metaphor. While Boris Johnson’s metaphors tend to revolve around gauche world war two references which often seem inappropriate, Van-Tam’s have been applauded. This morning the Today programme even broadcast a compilation.
Radio 4’s Today programme currently doing a mash-up of Jonathan Van-Tam’s pandemic metaphors. Weird year. pic.twitter.com/AAL1VMFMpN
— Ashley Cowburn (@ashcowburn) December 3, 2020
In his Q&A on BBC Breakfast, Van-Tam explained how he acquired this habit. He said:
I began testing them [his metaphors] many years ago, and I hope he won’t mind me saying – I don’t suppose he is a lance corporal any more – but L/Cpl Andy Lennox, if he’s listening, was one of the great people that used to ask me medical questions as we sat around tents in Snowdonia. And I practised the art there, I suppose, of turning medicine into stories, if I could. And with my family too – Mrs VT is very good at listening to all that stuff.
In a subsequent Q&A, on BBC News and Radio 5 Live, Van-Tam was asked to explain where the UK was in terms of his penalty shootout analogy. He replied:
If you want me to do a football analogy, then I have thought about this, I would say that, you know, it’s clear in the first half, the away team gave us an absolute battering, and what we’ve done now is it’s the 70th minute, they got a goal, and in the 70th minute we’ve now got an equaliser.
Okay, we’ve got to hold our nerve now, see if we can get another goal and nick it.
But the key thing is not to lose it, not to throw it away at this point because we’ve got a point on the board, and we’ve got the draw.
So, from that perspective, what I’m saying is that we need more vaccines, but we also need people to realise that these are not an instant ticket out of anywhere at the moment.
Rachel Burden, the Radio 5 Live presenter, said she had never seen so many listeners submit questions for a guest – even when she had had the prime minister in the studio.
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Williamson says normal performance tables for schools will not be published next year
Williamson says the Department for Education will not be publishing normal performance tables for schools next year.
Instead it will publish details on subjects taken and how well pupils are supported.
Williamson makes statement to MPs on exams for pupils in England next year
Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, is making a statement to MPs about the government’s plans to help pupils in England sitting exams next summer, to compensate for the coronavirus disruption they’ve suffered.
He says the government will not let Covid the life chances of an entire year of students.
It supports Ofqual’s decision to make grading next year more generous, so students are not at a disadvantage compared to previous years.
At the end of January students will get advance notice of some of the topics features in their GCSEs and A levels, he says. They will also be given exam aids, in recognition of the time lost in the classroom.
These measures have been drawn up with the aim of helping the most disadvantages, he says. Teachers will get the details in January, he says.
Where students cannot sit all their papers, or for students who have to miss all their papers, there will be a system to ensure they get a grade.
He says the problem this year was that the government tried to award grades without having pupils sit exams. “We are not going to make the same mistake again,” he says.
He says an expert group will consider what impact local variations in Covid conditions have had on pupils’ education.
Britain approved vaccine first because 'we're a much better country' than others, says Williamson
Yesterday Matt Hancock, the health secretary, claimed that the UK was able to approve the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine more quickly than countries in Europe because of Brexit. This was untrue (because EU law allows national medical regulators to make unilateral authorisations in an emergency) and even Boris Johnson - no stranger to a Brexit fib - could not bring himself to repeat the claim.
This morning Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, has come up with a simpler explanation for why Britain got there first. Simply, it’s because we’re better than everyone else. Asked if Brexit was a factor in Britain being able to approve the vaccine first, he replied:
I just reckon we’ve got the very best people in this country and we’ve obviously got the best medical regulator, much better than the French have, much better than the Belgians have, much better than the Americans have. That doesn’t surprise me at because we’re a much better country than every single one of them.
You can listen to the clip here. It looks and sounds very much as if Williamson’s declaration of UK exceptionalism was jocular, and that he was playing it up to avoid having to address the Brexit question, but you can decide for yourself.
Gavin Williamson tells LBC the UK approved a Covid vaccine first because ‘we're a much better country’ than France, Belgium and the US. @NickFerrariLBC https://t.co/NHEBwFYJf2
— LBC (@LBC) December 3, 2020
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Van-Tam says it's possible people might need to get regular coronavirus vaccines
Prof Jonathan Van-Tam, the deputy chief medical officer for England, has now done two lengthy Q&As on the BBC. Here are the main points.
- Van-Tam said it was possible that people might need to get regular coronavirus vaccines. He said he was confident that the vaccine would last for “quite a few months as an absolute minimum” and possibly much longer. But a revaccination programme might be needed if over time the effect started to wear off, he said. He said the government’s vaccine taskforce was preparing for this possibility and that he personally was starting to focus on this issue. He said:
We can’t say for certain yet whether we are going to need a flu-like revaccination programme. And we want to be in the best place to have further vaccines with which to do that, if we need to. But that really is something for the future. It is really unknowable at this point. But it is very much something that I see now as one of the goals only just over the horizon to get my head around, what if - and if - we will at any point in the future need to think about revaccination.
- He said it was too early to say when the vaccine programme would enable coronavirus restrictions to be lifted. He said:
If we can get to the point where the NHS is managing in a much more normal way than at present, then that gives politicians the option to think about what can be done next to make life more normal for us.
It’s not my job to give you a magic number here or a magic calendar date because so much depends on how quickly the vaccine programme is rolled out, whether the people called forwards for the vaccine accept it.
- He said that, even after people are vaccinated, they will not be able to return to normal life immediately. He explained:
Until we are properly confident of how the vaccine works and properly confident that disease levels are dropping, even if you have had the vaccine, you are going to need to continue to follow all the rules that apply for a while longer.
- He implied that the government was still considering the case for supplying people with vaccination certificates, which could then make it easier for people to access services or venues. Asked if this would happen, he replied:
I don’t think thinking is fully complete, or has evolved, to a point where I can give you any firm information.
But he said the NHS would have a clear digital record of who had been vaccinated.
There are definite plans to make sure that we absolutely know, and it is linked to health digital records, who has had the vaccine, who has one dose, two doses if two doses are required, which vaccine they’ve had, and when they’ve had it.
Today the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change has published a report saying, among other things, that the government should “urgently approve a digital platform for a health passport that can draw on vaccine and testing data to enable individuals to live freely and safely alongside Covid-19”.
- He said pregnant women were being advised not to get the vaccine not because there were any particular reasons to think there was a risk - but because the data was not available to be sure it was safe. The trials had not deliberately included pregnant women, he said.
Does the JCVI [Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation] suggest that pregnant women should be vaccinated? No, it does not, and that isn’t a sign that the JCVI, or me, have seen some terrible problem. It’s a definite sign that we don’t have the data at this point and therefore, safety first, always being cautious, even though there may well be no problem at all.
- He said he thought other international regulators were “very close” to approving the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.
- He said he expected the first doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to arrive in the UK within “hours, not days”. It is being imported from Belgium.
- He said he would be advising his elderly mother to get the vaccine. He said:
Look, I completely understand the anxieties, so I think what I would do is tackle this in three ways.
Number one, to tell you, plain and straight, that I genuinely have said to my 78-year-old mum, who’s probably listening now - ‘Mum, you must have this vaccine, or any of the vaccines that the MHRA approves as soon as they are available. This is really important, because you are so at risk’.
Jersey has announced new circuit-breaker restrictions with all hospitality venues and indoor sports facilities to close, PA Media reports. The measures are being put in place from Friday as the reproduction number - the R value - of coronavirus is understood to have reached between 1.6 and 2.0 on the Channel Island. The Jersey government has said it will keep the measures under review but they are expected to remain in place until January 4.
Gavin Williamson vows A-levels and GCSEs will not be cancelled in England
The education secretary, Gavin Williamson, has said he could “absolutely” give a cast-iron guarantee that exams in England would not be cancelled next year, as the government unveiled plans to support students affected by the pandemic, my colleagues Sally Weale and Josh Halliday report.
Jonathan Van-Tam leads government drive to persuade public vaccine is safe
Good morning. Following the announcement yesterday that the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine has been approved for use in the UK, the government now has to persuade the public to get it - or at least the 20% of people who have doubts. And it has decided to wheel out Prof Jonathan Van-Tam, the deputy chief medical officer for England who has become a surprise star of the No 10 coronavirus briefings and the government scientist with the best record at scoring goals in the communications contest (as he might put it himself). This morning it’s wall-to-wall JVT. He has just done a long Q&A on BBC Breakfast, he is doing the same thing now on BBC News and later he will be on ITV’s this morning.
Van-Tam told the BBC that the government had been preparing for the roll-out of a vaccine programme since March. He said:
We are the first to approve it because we’ve been really, really organised about this from the word go.
I started focusing behind the scenes on getting vaccines and vaccine preparedness back in March - actually quite a bit before the vaccine taskforce, which has been absolutely brilliant, was formed.
This began with conversations with Sir Patrick Vallance, the government chief scientific adviser, and from the word go we’ve been on the front foot, being clear that we needed vaccines as soon as was safely and assuredly possible.
And the MHRA, our regulator, has just been superb in this space and taken unprecedented steps to see data early, and that’s why we are where we are.
I will post more from his Q&A shortly.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: The ONS publishes its latest figures on the impact of coronavirus on the economy and society.
10.30am: Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, makes a statement to MPs about plans to help pupils in England sitting exams next summer, to compensate for the coronavirus disruption they’ve suffered.
11am: NHS test and trace publishes its latest weekly performance figures.
11.30am: The all-party parliamentary group on Covid publishes an interim report.
12pm: Downing Street is expected to hold its daily lobby briefing.
12.20pm: Nicola Sturgeon, the Scottish first minister, takes questions in the Scottish parliament.
2pm: Public Health England publishes its latest weekly Covid surveillance report.
Politics Live is now doubling up as the UK coronavirus live blog and, given the way the Covid crisis eclipses everything, this will continue for the foreseeable future. But we will be covering non-Covid political stories too, and when they seem more important or more interesting, they will take precedence.
Here is our global coronavirus live blog.
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. I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
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