Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Andrew Sparrow

Brexit: EU threatens legal action against UK unless it rewrites internal market bill – as it happened

Afternoon summary

  • Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, has suggested that trust between the EU and the UK has been damaged. He made the point in a tweet following the conclusion of this week’s UK-EU trade talks. In a statement he also said “significant differences remain in areas of essential interest for the EU”. He went on:

The UK is refusing to include indispensable guarantees of fair competition in our future agreement, while requesting free access to our market. We have taken note of the UK government’s statement on “A new approach to subsidy control”. But this falls significantly short of the commitments made in the political declaration.

Similarly, we are still missing important guarantees on non-regression from social, environmental, labour and climate standards.

That’s all from me. But our coverage continues on the global coronavirus live blog. It’s here.

From the Telegraph’s Harry Yorke

Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House of Representatives, has restated her opposition to the UK government’s internal market bill. Pelosi, like other Democrats in the US and the EU, believes the legislation would undermine the Good Friday agreement by increasing the chances of there being a hard border in Ireland. Her stance is important because leading Democrats have said that, if the UK undermined the Good Friday agreement, they would seek to block a UK-US trade deal. This is from the BBC’s Faisal Islam.

Minister reminds peers they will have chance to vote to amend internal market bill

Suella Braverman, the attorney general, has not been the only government law officer defending the government’s internal market bill. In the House of Lords earlier, Richard Keen, the advocate general for Scotland, also defended the government’s position, and he took a more nuanced line than the one in the HMG “legal position” (see 4.18pm) which has been attributed to Braverman. He said:

There is a very real tension between the direct effect of EU law pursuant to article 4 and what would occur if we had no agreement at the end of the transition period and there was no determination by the joint committee as to the way forward under the Northern Ireland protocol. That is because there are other provisions apart from article 4. There is article 4 of the protocol itself, which determines that Northern Ireland is part of the UK’s customs area. There is article 16 that deals with societal and economic pressures that could lead to us being in breach of the Belfast agreement. All these have to be considered.

Against that contingency, ministers considered it appropriate to provide, or ask parliament to provide, a means of addressing these issues. At the end of the day, it will be for the sovereign parliament to determine whether ministers should be able to deal with such a contingency. Indeed, it will be for this house to determine whether it considers it appropriate for ministers to be able to deal with such a contingency.

Some peers seem to have taken Lord Keen of Elie’s address as a reminder to peers that they will be free to vote to amend the bill. This is from the peer David Anderson, a QC and former independent reviewer of terrorism legislation.

Updated

Gove defies EU by saying UK cannot and will not shelve internal market bill

Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, has recorded a short interview which has just been broadcast on Sky News in which he said the UK would not be dropping the internal market bill.

Commenting on his meeting earlier with Maroš Šefčovič, the European commission vice-president who, along with Gove, is a co-chair of the joint committee (the body set up to implement the withdrawal agreement), Gove said:

Vice President Šefčovič ... requested that the UK withdraw its internal market legislation. I explained to vice-president Šefčovič that we could not and would not do that, and instead I stressed the vital important of reaching agreement through the joint committee on these important questions [how to implement the Northern Ireland protocol].

Asked to “swear on your job” that the government would not back down on this, Gove replied:

Yes. I made it perfectly clear to vice-president Šefčovič that we would not be withdrawing this legislation, and he understood that. Of course, he regretted it.

But we also stressed the vital importance of making progress.

Michael Gove.
Michael Gove. Photograph: Sky News

Updated

England adds Portugal to list of countries covered by quarantine rule – but removes Sweden

The UK government has updated its list of countries covered by quarantine regulations. These new rules apply to England.

  • Quarantine rules now apply to people coming to the UK from Portugal (apart from the Azores and Madeira), Hungary, French Polynesia and Réunion because of a “significant increase” in confirmed cases in those countries, the government says.
  • Sweden has been added to the travel corridor list - meaning quarantine rules no longer apply to people arriving from Sweden.

The full government announcement is here.

Updated

Brussels has given Boris Johnson three weeks to drop plans to break international law or the UK will face financial or trade sanctions, as EU lawyers ruled that Britain has already breached the withdrawal agreement by tabling the internal market bill, my colleagues Daniel Boffey and Lisa O’Carroll report.

But, of course, it is possible that the internal market bill could end up being rewritten without the government doing it itself. This is what the Labour peer Andrew Adonis said on Twitter after listening to Michael Howard’s intervention in the House of Lords earlier. (See 2.37pm.)

And this is from the Telegraph’s Christopher Hope.

How is No 10 going to respond to the threat from the European commission? (See 3.56pm.) As the Daily Mail’s political editor, Jason Groves, argues, the one thing that almost certainly won’t happen is that Boris Johnson will agree to back down.

Updated

Simon Coveney, the Irish foreign minister, has welcomed the European commission’s statement about the internal market bill. (See 3.56pm.)

Here are two more lawyers on the government’s legal defence of the internal market bill.

From the Secret Barrister, author of acclaimed books about the legal profession

From Dr Holger Hestermeyer, a reader in international dispute resolution at King’s College London

Updated

Government's legal defence of internal market bill dismissed as 'utterly risible' by top lawyer

Prof Mark Elliott, professor of public law at Cambridge University, says the UK government’s legal defence of the internal market bill (see 4.18pm), which would have been drafted by the attorney general, Suella Braverman, is “risible”. He explains why here.

It sounds as if the meeting between Michael Gove and Maroš Šefčovič really got quite heated. This is from the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg.

Updated

UK government publishes legal position defending decision to ignore international law

The UK government has now released its own statement (pdf) setting out what it calls its “legal position” (ie, its justification) for the internal markets bill.

Essentially, it argues that domestic law, and decisions by parliament, trump international law. It claims that the supreme court ruling in the article 50 case supports this argument. Here is an extract.

It is an established principle of international law that a state is obliged to discharge its treaty obligations in good faith. This is, and will remain, the key principle in informing the UK’s approach to international relations. However, in the difficult and highly exceptional circumstances in which we find ourselves, it is important to remember the fundamental principle of parliamentary sovereignty.

Parliament is sovereign as a matter of domestic law and can pass legislation which is in breach of the UK’s Treaty obligations. Parliament would not be acting unconstitutionally in enacting such legislation. This ‘dualist’ approach is shared by other, similar legal systems such as Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Under this approach, treaty obligations only become binding to the extent that they are enshrined in domestic legislation. Whether to enact or repeal legislation, and the content of that legislation, is for parliament and parliament alone. This principle was recently approved unanimously by the supreme court in R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union [2017] UKSC 5.

The legislation which implements the withdrawal agreement including the Northern Ireland protocol is expressly subject to the principle of parliamentary sovereignty. Parliament’s ability to pass provisions that would take precedence over the withdrawal agreement was expressly confirmed in section 38 of the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Act 2020, with specific reference to the EU law concept of ‘direct effect’.

For a more detailed account of how the UK government would be open to challenge if it went ahead with the internal markets bill, it is worth reading this Twitter thread by Anton Spisak, a former civil servant and Brexit specialist who know works for the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change.

The EU is threatening the UK with legal action if it does not drop key parts of the internal markets bill. But what legal options are open it it?

RTE’s Tony Connelly has a good explanation in a Twitter thread that summarises the legal advice provided to the commission. It starts here.

And here are some of the the main points.

EU threatens legal action against UK unless it rewrites internal market bill

The European commission has just released a lengthy statement following today’s meeting between Maroš Šefčovič, a commission vice-president, and Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, about the UK’s decision to introduce legislation (the internal market bill) that would override the withdrawal agreement. It is about as angry and aggressive as any formal statement from the EU to the UK throughout the entire Brexit process.

The commission says passing the bill would be constitute “an extremely serious violation of the withdrawal agreement and international law”.

It says that if the UK does not drop the parts of the bill that would violate the withdrawal agreement, it would take the UK to court.

Vice-President Maroš Šefčovič called on the UK government to withdraw these measures from the draft bill in the shortest time possible and in any case by the end of the month. He stated that by putting forward this bill, the UK has seriously damaged trust between the EU and the UK. It is now up to the UK government to re-establish that trust.

He reminded the UK government that the Withdrawal Agreement contains a number of mechanisms and legal remedies to address violations of the legal obligations contained in the text – which the European Union will not be shy in using.

It also implies that, if the UK does not drop the offending clauses in the bill, the EU could terminate the UK-EU trade talks. It says:

The vice-president stated, in no uncertain terms, that the timely and full implementation of the withdrawal agreement, including the protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland – which Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his government agreed to, and which the UK Houses of Parliament ratified, less than a year ago – is a legal obligation. The European Union expects the letter and spirit of this agreement to be fully respected. Violating the terms of the withdrawal agreement would break international law, undermine trust and put at risk the ongoing future relationship negotiations.

Updated

From Sky’s Sam Coates

Dominic Cummings never threatened civil service with 'hard rain', Gove claims

Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s chief adviser, was widely reported to have told a meeting of special advisers in June that a “hard rain” was coming for the civil service. Since then several figures at the top of the service have been forced out, and wider change has been proposed. The phrase has been widely quoted as summarising Cummings hardline approach to Whitehall.

Only he did not say it, according to Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister and a close friend of Cummings. (Cummings used to work for him at the Department for Education.)

In his evidence to the Commons public administration committee, Gove was asked about the phrase. He said he was not at the meeting where it was said to have been used, but he said some of his colleagues were there, and they did not hear Cummings say this. Gove also said he had never heard Cummings use this term himself. He said his understanding was that the report was based on a “mishearing”.

Dominic Cummings.
Dominic Cummings. Photograph: Henry Nicholls/Reuters

Updated

Shortage of Covid tests creating problems for schools, says teaching union

The Association of School and College Leaders has said shortages of coronavirus tests are undermining the reopening of schools and colleges in England, with around 200 headteachers and principals saying they have struggled to obtain tests for staff and students.

The lack of tests has meant that thousands of pupils with suspected Covid-19 symptoms, and those who had been in close contact with them, have been isolating at home, taking them out of the classroom while they wait for tests to be made available.

Geoff Barton, the general secretary of the ASCL, said the “fantastic work” of schools and colleges in reopening this month was being put at risk by the government’s failures. He said:

Our frustration is with the government which has failed to live up to its promise to ensure that the test-and-trace system is able to meet the level of demand that it must have been perfectly obvious would be needed.

Even now, the health secretary seems to be in denial, choosing to blame people for seeking tests when they are not eligible, rather than addressing the problem.

The ASCL said it had received reports from its members in England of being directed to test centres long distances away, including Inverness and Aberdeen, while others said home testing kits were either unavailable or slow to arrive.

One school leader said: “I have approximately 10 pupils who are at home with symptoms, all of whom are waiting for tests. Most have only been able to get postal tests, none have been able to get tests locally within seven days. Potentially I could have a number of positive cases linked to my school and not know it.”

Another said: “In our area we have had staff and students being asked to travel over 200 miles for a test and being told no home tests are available. This adds to the time staff are absent, putting more pressure on their colleagues and for some staff and students these sorts of distances are not realistic when they feel unwell or due to the very limited public transport in this area.”

Updated

Face coverings on sale at a market in London today.
Face coverings on sale at a market in London today. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA

Michael Gove gives evidence to public administration committee

Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, has just started giving evidence to the Commons public administration and constitutional affairs committee. There is a live feed here.

The subject of the hearing is the work of the Cabinet Office, but Gove is taking questions now on the internal market bill.

Q: Will this legislation affect the Barnett formula?

No, says Gove.

Q: What is the government’s vision for devolution?

Gove says the government thinks devolution provides the best of both worlds. It wants the UK government and devolved governments to work together to get the best for citizens.

This is from the FT’s Jim Brunsden.

Former Tory leader Michael Howard condemns government's 'scant regard' for treaty obligations

The government has faced vehement criticism from former Tory leader Michael Howard in the Lords over its admission it will breach international law in seeking to unilaterally amend elements of the Brexit withdrawal agreement.

Speaking in a brief debate sought by the shadow attorney general, Charlie Falconer, Howard asked Richard Keen, the Scottish advocate general, who was responding for the government:

Does my noble and learned friend simply not understand the damage done to our reputation for probity and respect for the rule of law by those five words uttered by his ministerial colleague in another place on Tuesday – words I never thought I would hear uttered by a British minister, far less a Conservative minister? How can we reproach Russia or China or Iran when their conduct falls below internationally accepted standards, when we are showing such scant regard for our treaty obligations?

Lord Keen had been identified as a possible waverer, even resigner, over the issue, but he was loyal in the debate. He told Howard the government was simply “endeavouring to allow for a contingency that may arise very soon” over Irish border arrangements.

Howard is the third former Conservative leader to criticise the government for planning to override the withdrawal agreement. Theresa May and Sir John Major have both spoken out strongly against this too.

Updated

Johnson's 24-hour test result target still far away from being met, latest figures show

NHS Test and Trace has published its latest weekly performance bulletin (pdf). Here are the main points.

  • NHS Test and Trace is continuing to miss almost a third of people identified as close contacts of people who have tested positive. For a test and trace system to be effective, the government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies says 80% of contacts must be reached and told to self-isolate. But in the week ending 2 September the figure was 69.2%, down very slightly from the previous week. The average for the period since test and trace was launched is 78.8%. Here is the key table from the report.
Close contacts reached
Close contacts reached Photograph: NHSTT/NHS Test and Trace
  • The service is still failing to meet the 24-hour target for test results set by Boris Johnson. The PM told MPs in early summer that by the end of June the government would get “all tests turned around within 24 hours ... except for difficulties with postal tests or insuperable problems like that.” The latest figures show that 92% of tests processed in hospital laboratories (so-called pillar 1 tests) get completed within 24 hours. But tests conducted outside hospitals or at home (pillar 2 tests), which account for roughly two thirds of all tests that are carried out, are nowhere near to meeting this target. Here are the figures.
Percentage of test results received within 24 hours
Percentage of test results received within 24 hours Photograph: NHSTT

This chart presents the same data in another form.

Time taken to receive test results, by where test carried out
Time taken to receive test results, by where test carried out Photograph: NHSTT
  • The number of people testing positive in the week ending 2 September, at 9,864, was up 43% on the previous week.
  • Some 82% of people referred to the service in the week ending 2 September were reached and asked to provide details of their close contacts. That was up from 79.9% the previous week.

(Some readers object to us calling it NHS Test and Trace, because all the actual work is carried out by private contractors like Serco. But we use this title because that’s the name given to it by the government, which set it up. It’s what it called. You could argue that it is misleading, because it is not part of the mainstream NHS, but we still call the Conservatives the Conservatives - even though they don’t seem to favour conserving much at the moment.)

Updated

The UK government will attempt to negotiate up to 27 bilateral deals to receive information on criminals and terrorists if the EU continues to refuse to allow access to a major crime-fighting database, the Home Office’s most senior official said today.

Entrance to the Schengen information system (SIS II), a huge EU database, will end at the end of the year unless there is a major breakthrough in negotiations, the Home Office’s permanent secretary, Matthew Rycroft, told MPs.

The EU has said it is legally impossible for non-EU countries not respecting free movement of people to access the database, where police across the continent share millions of pieces of information on criminal suspects, and has proposed more basic information sharing.

Appearing before the public accounts committee, Rycroft said that the government had already begun talks with other member states so that they could access information by other means. He said:

The UK has put forward an offer from our position that would allow an equivalent of the Schengen information system to continue. We believe that would be a good outcome for both the UK and the EU at the end of the transition. But we will also be ready for alternative arrangements to be made if that is what we need to do in the event of no further deal.

Asked by the committee’s chair, Meg Hillier, what that alternative arrangement would be, Rycroft said:

The fact that the commission has set out that it is not legally possible for non-Schengen third country to cooperate through the Schengen information system is in our view one of the reasons we haven’t reached an agreement yet. There does have to be a shift from the EU side in order for us to come to an agreement.

If that shift doesn’t come and there isn’t a deal, then we will be looking at a combination of bilateral agreements and other instruments – of course there were lots of ways that the UK collaborated with EU member states in the past.

Hillier responded: “A chill goes down my spine when I hear about bilateral agreements – that is 27 different agreements which would not be up and running by January. What is the risk to the British public on this crucial issue?”

Rycroft said: “If we are in that scenario there will be a mix of multilateral and bilateral steps. There are other instruments that can be used. The UK is one of the safest countries in the world. That will continue to be the case and we will make the best of whichever scenario we are in.”

Updated

In her statement to the Scottish parliament Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister, also said that a total of 161 people had tested positive for coronavirus across Scotland in the past 24 hours, taking the total number of people who have tested positive in the country to 22,039.

As PA Media reports, these latest cases are 1.9% of people newly tested, no change on the previous day.

No more deaths of confirmed patients have been recorded in the past 24 hours and this toll remains at 2,499.

Of the new cases, provisional figures indicate 65 are in Greater Glasgow and Clyde, 46 in Lanarkshire and 12 in Lothian.

There are 266 people in hospital confirmed to have the virus, a fall of eight in 24 hours.
Of these patients, seven were in intensive care, up by one.

Updated

“Covid-secure marshals” announced as part of a plan to enforce stricter rules on social gatherings will have no formal powers and must be paid for by local authorities, the government has said.

Boris Johnson told a press conference yesterday the marshals would “boost the local enforcement capacity” as he announced new rules designed to slow the spread of coronavirus.

But the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) said they would not be given enforcement powers in new legislation banning people in England from meeting in groups of more than six from Monday, PA Media reports.

Marshals had already been deployed by Leeds city council and Cornwall council, the government said. Other local authorities would now be “encouraged” to hire marshals, or use volunteers and existing council employees, with money from their own budgets, a MHCLG spokeswoman said.

She said they would probably wear high-visibility clothing to “support members of the public in one-way systems and remind them of guidelines”. Other tasks could be to “give out masks and hand sanitiser in public places”, she added.

Updated

Topless protesters chained to the railings of parliament today during a climate change protest by the group Extinction Rebellion.
Topless protesters chained to the railings of parliament today during a climate change protest by the group Extinction Rebellion. Photograph: Facundo Arrizabalaga/EPA

Belgium has been cited by the UK health secretary, Matt Hancock, as a model for getting coronavirus under control – just as its public health body recorded a 15% rise in the number of daily infections compared with the previous week, my colleague Daniel Boffey reports.

Scotland will also introduce ban on people meeting in groups of more than six, Sturgeon announces

In her statement to the Scottish parliament Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister, announced that from Monday next week people in Scotland will only be able to meet in groups from two households, both indoors and outdoors. She told MSPs:

We have concluded that it is necessary to tighten some existing restrictions, to help curb the spread of the virus especially between and within households.

As of now, up to eight people from three households can meet indoors. Larger outdoor gatherings are also permitted.

I can confirm that we intend to change this, so that a maximum of six people from two households will now be permitted to meet together.

To help reduce transmission - but also simplify the rules as much as possible - this new limit will apply both indoors, in houses, in pubs and restaurants, and also outdoors including in private gardens.

Sturgeon said there would be some “limited exceptions” for the new limit of six people in any gathering, for organised sports and places of worship. And she said that any children under 12 who are part of two households meeting up would not count towards the limit of six people. She went on:

Lastly, given the importance of these life events and the distress caused by not being able to mark them, we intend to allow a limited exception for funerals, weddings and civil partnerships.

Already, up to 20 people can attend ceremonies for these occasions. We intend to retain that limit for now.

The new Scottish rules are very similar to the ones announced by Boris Johnson for England yesterday, although there are some minor differences. In England the six people can come from multiple households, not just two households. But in England children count towards the six; in Scotland under-12s aren’t included.

Updated

In his final reply to an MP in his Commons statement Matt Hancock, the health secretary, said that the Scottish government’s contact tracing app, which has just been launched (see 11.08am), was “technically excellent” and that he strongly endorsed it.

The Scottish government has defended its handling of freedom of information requests during the coronavirus pandemic, and said it will prioritise tackling that crisis over improving public access to information.

In its response to stinging criticisms this morning from the Scottish information commissioner, Daren Fitzhenry (see 10.48am), it said it had “some concerns” about his complaints about a steep decline in response times and its reallocation of staff away from handling FoI requests. A spokeswoman said things had improved, with 79% of responses answered on time in June, but added:

The impact on the government of resourcing our response to the ongoing emergency, particularly in the early months, has been enormous, with large numbers of staff being redeployed and having to work extremely long hours. While the virus remains active, and in the absence of a vaccine, our priority must be to focus our resources on suppressing the virus.

Sir Desmond Swayne, a Conservative, asks Hancock if he is starting to consider that the possibility that government policies are having an impact “worse than the disease itself”. Hancock says he disagrees.

These are from my colleague Peter Walker, who points out that Matt Hancock has been using this statement to repeatedly accuse the opposition of not supporting mass testing. It is not really true, but it chimes with the line used against Labour by Boris Johnson at PMQs yesterday.

UPDATE: These are from Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, responding to Peter’s tweets.

Updated

Back in the Commons Labour’s Clive Efford asks Matt Hancock to respond to what Prof David Spiegelhalter said about the potential problems with a mass testing programme on Radio 4 this morning. (See 9.40am.) Spiegelhalter said there might be too many false positives, leading to many healthy people having their lives disrupted.

Hancock says that of course the specificity of a test is incredibly important, but that there are ways of dealing with this. He says this will be taken into account in the programme.

Updated

In the Scottish parliament Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister, has said that Scotland will not be moving to the next stage for the easing of restrictions.

This should not come as a surprise. In its route map (pdf) published earlier this year, the Scottish government said restrictions would be eased in four phases. Scotland is currently at phase three. To get to phase four, “the virus must effectively have ceased to be a significant issue in Scotland,” the document said. It went on:

That might be because, for example, an effective vaccine has been developed and used on sufficient scale in Scotland and/or we have an effective treatment available across Scotland that essentially removed the health risk from the virus and/or transmission is so low that we are confident that the virus can be controlled without the restrictions of phase three.

Back in the Commons Sir Graham Brady, the chair of the Conservative backbench 1922 Committee, asks why the government is imposing the “most profound” restrictions on personal life from Monday without those plans being debated in the Commons.

Hancock says the government has had to move quickly, but he says he will take up this point with colleagues.

Matt Hancock
Matt Hancock Photograph: Parliament TV

Britain has already breached the withdrawal agreement by tabling the internal market bill, prompting Brussels to plan legal action that could lead to financial and trade sanctions, according to a leaked EU legal opinion, my colleagues Daniel Boffey and Lisa O’Carroll report.

Munira Wilson, the Lib Dem MP for Twickenham, says 20,000 spectators are due to attend a rugby match at Twickenham next month. Why is that being allowed to go ahead?

Hancock says this matter is under review. A decision will be taken shortly, he says.

Here is the clip of MPs laughing at Matt Hancock, and his response, after he spoke about what Operation Moonshot might be able to achieve. (See 11.50am.)

Greg Clark, the Conservative chair of the science committee, urges Hancock to “get a grip” on the problems with testing. He says it is wrong to blame people who are seeking tests.

Hancock says he is considering imposing 'eligibility' condition to ensure people only get Covid tests if they need them

Hancock says until now he has been reluctant to use an “eligibility test” to restrict access to coronavirus tests.

But, given what is happening now, he is considering this, he says.

(Hancock has said 25% of people getting tests now don’t need them, because they don’t have symptoms.)

Updated

Hancock says the UK government is working with the Scottish government and other governments on an update to its own app.

He says the SNP and Labour are making a huge mistake in opposing mass testing.

Jeremy Hunt, the Conservative chair of the health committee, says he welcomes the moonshot initiative as someone who has always called for more mass testing. But how much of this is dependent on new technologies?

Hancock says the government is committed to expanding testing to 500,000 tests per day using current technologies. But he cannot put a figure on what might be possible with new technologies, he says.

Hancock is responding to Ashworth.

He says Labour cannot decide if it supports mass testing or not.

He says people should get a test if they have symptoms, but not if they don’t. The situation has not changed, he says.

(Earlier Ashworth said Hancock’s advice had been ambiguous, because he had said people should get a test if they were concerned.)

Hancock says £500m has already been allocated for the moonshot initiative, but he says it is likely to get more.

On schools, Hancock says if someone in a bubble tests positive, everyone else in that bubble must self-isolate. A bubble is defined as people in close contact.

Updated

Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, is responding to Hancock.

He says many pupils are having to stay at home. Is it government policy that, if one or two pupils in a year group have coronavirus, the whole year has to stay off?

If so, are their parents eligible for sick pay?

Ashworth says, when Hancock said Ashworth had quoted wrong figures about test and trace on Tuesday, the Full Fact website subsequently said he was right.

He says mass testing is too important to become another failed project.

How quickly will Operation Moonshot be delivered?

What will it cost? Will it be £100bn?

Who will deliver this?

Has the government already signed contracts with GSK, Serco and G4S to deliver this?

When will the government deliver effective testing in care homes?

Given that Hancock has failed to deliver proper testing, why can we trust him to deliver this moonshot?

Updated

Hancock says the so-called “Operation Moonshot” could allow people to lead more normal lives. Arts venues could let people in if they test negative on the day.

Some MPs laugh at this point. Hancock says he has heard the “naysayers” before, but the government has expanded testing despite people doubting this would happen.

He says he looks forward to rolling this out, and he is determined to get there.

He says if this can happen, even challenging sectors like theatres will be able to get closer to normal by Christmas.

Updated

Hancock says the government is increasing its testing capacity.

There have been challenges, he says. But he says the average distance people have to travel to get a test is 6.4 miles. And 90% of people have to travel less than 22 miles, he says.

Matt Hancock starts his statement to MPs by saying he met the Speaker, Sir Lindsay Hoyle, last night and intends to ensure he addresses the Commons as often as possible. Yesterday Hoyle reprimanded him for announcing the “rule of six” change outside parliament.

Hancock says he is today updating MPs on the new rules.

He is summarising the rules announced by Boris Johnson yesterday.

This is from RTE’s Tony Connelly, referring to the Gove/Šefčovič meeting. (See 11.35am.)

Matt Hancock's statement to MPs on coronavirus

Matt Hancock, the health secretary, is about to make his statement to MPs on coronavirus.

Maroš Šefčovič, the European commission vice-president, has said he will express “serious concerns” to Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, about the UK’s plan to override the Brexit withdrawal agreement when they meet later.

Šefčovič and Gove are joint chairs of the joint committee set up to implement the provisions of the withdrawal agreement, but they are holding an emergency meeting, at the request of the EU, following the publication of the internal market bill (that effectively rewrites the withdrawal agreement).

Arriving in London, Šefčovič told reporters:

I called for an extraordinary meeting of the joint committee which is going to take place in a couple of hours.

I came here to express the serious concerns that the European Union has over the proposed bill. So that will be the nature of our discussions today.

Asked if he had lost trust in the UK government, he said: “Let’s hear what Michael Gove will tell me this afternoon.”

Maroš Šefčovič outside Europe House, the headquarters of the EU delegation in the UK in London
Maroš Šefčovič outside Europe House, the headquarters of the EU delegation in the UK in London. Photograph: Tolga Akmen/AFP/Getty Images

Updated

Government allocates five days for Commons debates on internal market bill

The government has allotted five days for debates in the Commons on the internal market bill, MPs have been told. Stuart Andrew, the deputy leader of the Commons, announced during the business statement that the bill would get its second reading on Monday next week. There will then be four days for committee stage debates, on Tuesday and Wednesday next week, and on Monday and Tuesday in the following week.

Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the Commons, normally presents the business statement, but Andrew said he was standing in today because Rees-Mogg is self-isolating at home after one of his children developed coronavirus symptoms.

Updated

More than 100,000 people download Scotland's new contact-tracing app as it launches

More than 100,000 people have now downloaded the Scottish government’s newly launched contact-tracing app, Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister, has announced.

The app ensures that, if someone tests positive for coronavirus, people who have recently been in close contact with them – defined as within 2 metres for at least 15 minutes – get an alert advising them what to do next. The data is anonymised, and deleted after two weeks. Sturgeon has also tweeted this video explaining how it works.

The UK government has also been working on its own app for England, but in June Matt Hancock, the health secretary, said the government was abandoning the model it had been piloting in the Isle of Wight because it was flawed. He said the government was working on an alternative, but recently ministers have gone quiet on when – or if – this will be ready for a national rollout.

Updated

Plans for a train service between Blackpool and London have been scrapped because of Covid-19, PA Media reports. Rail chiefs at Grand Central said the proposed route was no longer viable due to economic uncertainty and changed travel patterns.

The firm’s managing director, Richard McClean, said:

So much effort has been put into these exciting plans to launch services between London and Blackpool that it is heartbreaking to have to abandon them at this point but the pandemic and its effect on our expansion plans have just proved too big an obstacle.

Despite months of work to adjust our costs and monitor travel behaviour for signs of change it became more obvious to us that to invest in what is essentially a start-up enterprise in this climate was simply not feasible and therefore we reluctantly reached the very tough decision to cease the project permanently.

Blackpool.
Blackpool. Photograph: Oli Scarff/AFP via Getty Images

The Scottish information commissioner has told Scottish ministers to dramatically improve their handling of freedom of information requests after a steep decline in performance during the coronavirus pandemic.

Daren Fitzhenry, the commissioner, said:

Failing to take action at this time will send a dangerous message to staff and the wider public about the perceived importance of openness, transparency and accountability through FoI, at a time when the public benefit from these characteristics has never been clearer.

In a report updating the Scottish parliament on how well the devolved government was doing to improve its FoI systems, Fitzhenry said the number of information requests answered on time had slumped from 95% to 58% from March to May this year.

While it was understandable FoI systems would be affected by officials being diverted to work on the government’s response to the pandemic, this level of “significant” disruption was unacceptable, he said.

While some disruption from the Covid-19 pandemic is to be expected, the extent and speed of the Scottish government’s recent decline raises real concerns about the long-term sustainability of its FoI improvement work. I would urge ministers to direct immediate attention towards this work to ensure that the recent improvements are safeguarded and protected.

Fitzhenry carried out a statutory investigation into the Scottish government’s handling of FoI requests after journalists, including reporters at the Guardian, published an open letter in June 2017 complaining of significant and longstanding problems. He said ministers had since made significant progress addressing those concerns.

Updated

Year-plus waits for hospital treatment in England reach highest level since 2008

NHS England has published its latest performance statistics for July and August. PA Media have picked out some of the key points.

  • A&E attendances at hospitals in England continue to be below levels a year ago. A total of 1.7m attendances were recorded in August 2020, down 19% from 2.1m attendances in August 2019. In June and July A&E attendances were respectively 33% and 30% below figures for the previous year.
  • The number of people having to wait more than 18 weeks to start hospital treatment in England rose to 2.15m in July of this year, more than three times the number in July 2019 (620,454) and the highest number for any calendar month since current records began in August 2007.
  • There were 83,203 people waiting more than 52 weeks to start hospital treatment in July, the highest number for any month since November 2008.
  • The total number of people admitted for routine treatment in hospitals in England was down 51% in July compared with a year ago. There were 142,818 patients admitted for treatment during the month, down from 314,280 in July 2019. In May and June the figures for people admitted for routine treatment were down 82% and 67% respectively.
  • A total of 179,503 urgent cancer referrals were made by GPs in England in July 2020, down from 221,805 in July 2019 - a fall of 19%. This compares with a year-on-year drop of 21% in June and 47% in May.
  • Urgent breast cancer referrals were down from 15,824 in July 2019 to 10,441 in July 2020 - a fall of 34%.

Updated

Only around half of employees were working from their normal workplace in August, according to a report from the Office for National Statistics.

The ONS has published its latest survey looking at the impact of coronavirus on the economy and it found that in the period between 10 and 23 August 11% of workers were on full or partial furlough, 36% were working remotely and 49% were not working from their normal workplace.

The ONS says:

The arts, entertainment and recreation industry had the highest proportion of their workforce on partial leave or on furlough leave under the terms of the UK government’s coronavirus job retention scheme (CJRS), at 41%. This was followed by the accommodation and food service activities industry, and the administrative and support service activities industry, at 29% and 18% respectively.

Here is a chart showing what was happening sector by sector.

Working arrangements in August, by sector
Working arrangements in August, by sector Photograph: ONS/ONs

Expert questions drive to get people back into offices in England

One of the UK’s top disease experts has suggested the government should “maybe pause at the headlong rush to get everybody back into offices” in England, my colleague Helen Pidd reports.

Scientists cast doubt on viability of Johnson's 'moonshot' testing plan

Good morning. At his press conference last night Boris Johnson told us about his “moonshot” plan to deal with coronavirus, and how he was “hopeful” that that by next spring millions of people would be able to get quick, easy Covid tests and, if negative, go to crowded events, ignoring the need for social distancing.

Overnight we learned more details of this proposal, which is even more ambitious than Johnson implied. As Robert Booth and Sarah Boseley report, government documents admit it could cost £100bn.

But do scientists think it is realistic? This morning we’ve heard from two of them expressing strong doubts. This is what Allan Wilson, president of the Institute of Biomedical Science, told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme this morning.

What [the PM] seems to be describing is a rapid test that’s available for mass screening and that gives results within a few minutes. That does not exist at the moment. And no country is using a test like that; it simply is not there.

I’m not saying that you shouldn’t be ambitious and aim for such a test. But it doesn’t exist at the moment, so it’s a a little bit difficult to see how it is going to fit in with what we’re doing at the moment.

The numbers are a bit dramatic. For example, with rapid tests that are available at the moment, you probably can do no more than about 100 a day. So if he’s aiming for 10m a day, that’s quite a target to aim for.

And Prof David Spiegelhalter, professor of the public understanding of risk at Cambridge University, told the Today programme that he had concerns about the plan from a statistical viewpoint. He explained:

Mass screening always seems like a good idea. But the huge danger is false positives. No tests are perfect. It is not a simple yes, no thing. And if you are going to have a test that would allow someone into a theatre, or allow them back to work, you have to be really sure they are not infectious. So you have to set a threshold that is not very sensitive, that would pick up anything that hints at being infectious.

That means that such a test will always generate a very large number of false positives. Now, that doesn’t matter so much perhaps if you are just being stopped going into a theatre. But it’s not just a matter of testing. You’ve got this whole downstream business; that person will be told to isolate, their contacts will be told to isolate and so on. And if you only have 1% false positives among all the people who are not infectious, and you are testing the whole country, that’s 600,000 people unnecessarily labelled as positive ...

So statisticians, let alone all the logistical issues, are deeply concerned about this.

When Today’s Justin Webb put it to Spiegelhalter that he saw this more as a Mars shot than a moonshot, Spiegelhalter replied: “Your words.”

It is worth pointing out that Prof Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical adviser, and Sir Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser, expressed some scepticism about the plan at last night’s press conference. The government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies has also published a paper setting out its reservations. And last week Jason Leitch, the Scottish government’s national clinical director, also sounded sceptical about what mass testing might achieve, describing some of the scenarios being talked about as “like fiction”.

Here is the agenda for the day.

Around 11.30am: Matt Hancock, the health secretary, makes a statement in the Commons about coronavirus.

Morning: Downing Street lobby briefing.

Lunchtime: Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, is due to hold an emergency meeting with Maroš Šefčovič, the European commission vice-president who, with Gove, jointly chairs the joint committee in charge of implementing the withdrawal agreement.

12.20pm: Nicola Sturgeon takes first minister’s questions in the Scottish parliament.

2.30pm: Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, is due to give evidence to the Commons public administration committee.

Politics Live has been doubling up as the UK coronavirus live blog for some time and, given the way the Covid crisis eclipses everything, for the foreseeable future it will still mostly focus on coronavirus. But we will be covering non-Covid political stories too, and where they seem more important and 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.

Updated

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
‘You should be embarrassed’: Family orders 2 Tours of Italy at Olive Garden. Then they eat it ‘family style.’ People aren’t having it
An influencer family has divided the internet after sharing how they have a cheap night out at Olive Garden. The Milehams (@themilehams), who have 147,000 followers on TikTok, have gone viral after sharing how they eat at Olive Garden “family style.”
The Mary Sue
The Mary Sue
Plus-size model Tess Holliday says life insurance company told her she was ‘ineligible’ due to her weight
300-pound model says she is a ‘non-smoking, non-drinking, non-health issue having human’
The Independent UK
The Independent UK
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. just debuted a bizarre action figure based on himself and the internet doesn’t know what to think
RFK Jr. thinks it's cool but the rest of us just think it's cringe.
We Got This Covered
We Got This Covered
Cara Delevingne's 'second coming' of womanhood
Cara Delevingne has been going through her "second coming of being a woman" because she finally appreciates clothes and make-up.
BANG Premier
BANG Premier
Website Claiming to Track Women's 'Body Count' Draws Backlash From Thousands; Calls it 'Misogynistic'
A new AI website, Checkhercount.com, is under fire for estimating women's sexual history from Instagram profiles, raising privacy and misogyny concerns.
International Business Times UK
International Business Times UK
‘The way we love them in life is the way we love them in death’: a Gullah Geechee community fights for their cemetery
In a win for the Gullah Geechee people on St Helena Island in South Carolina, access to a long-used cemetery has been restored
The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.
Download on the AppStore Get it on Google Play