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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Andrew Sparrow

UK Covid: arrivals from South America and Portugal banned from Friday over Brazilian variant concerns – as it happened

The UK will ban arrivals from South America and Portugal from Friday
The UK will ban arrivals from South America and Portugal from Friday. Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

Early evening summary

That’s all from me for today. But our coverage continues on our global coraonvirus live blog. It’s here.

Updated

A further 48,682 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK have been reported today, Public Health England said. That is more than the total for yesterday (47,525), but consistent with the recent trend, which has shown new cases falling from the early January peak.

The publication of the latest deaths data on the government’s dashboard has been delayed due to a “processing issue”, Public Health England added.

And here are today’s figures from Northern Ireland.

Here are today’s Covid figures from Public Health Wales.

The Royal Statistical Society has criticised the government for the quality of its vaccine information published today. It has put out this statement.

Steve Baker, who was not commenting on the Sun story earlier (see 5.33pm), now says he thinks Boris Johnson is the only person who can lead the country out of lockdown.

Tory Covid Recovery Group says PM must produce 'clear plan' out of lockdown to avoid threat to his leadership

Steve Baker, the deputy chair of the Covid Recovery Group (CRG), which represents anti-lockdown or lockdown-sceptic Conservative MPs, is urging colleagues to tell the chief whip that Boris Johnson could be forced out of office if he does not set out a clear plan for the end of restrictions, the Sun’s Harry Cole is reporting.

In his story, Cole quotes from a note Baker sent to fellow members of the CRG. Sky’s Sam Coates has posted the message in full on Twitter.

Here is an extract.

Government has adopted a strategy devoid of any commitment to liberty without any clarification about when our most basic freedoms will be restored and with no guarantee that they will never be taken away again. People are telling me that they are losing faith in our Conservative party leadership because they are not standing up for our values as a party ...

We have asked you all to please be in touch with [the] chief whip to support our letter to him. I am sorry to have to say this again and as bluntly as this: it is imperative you equip the chief whip today with your opinion that debate will become about the PM’s leadership if the government does not set out a clear plan for when our full freedoms will be restored, with a guarantee that this strategy will not be used again next winter.

Baker is not commenting on the leak.

In a statement on Monday, Mark Harper, the chair of the CRG, argued that the lockdown should end on 8 March. He explained:

The prime minister says there is a time lag of up to three weeks for immunity to develop after a vaccination has been administered. So if we hit the crucial 15 February deadline, the four top-risk groups will have immunity by 8 March – three weeks after the last jab. At that point – once all the key groups have become immune to Covid – what possible reason could there be for keeping severe restrictions in place a second longer?

Some Conservative MPs feel as strongly as Barker and Harper do about the lockdown, but there is no evidence yet to show they have enough support to pose a serious challenge to Johnson’s leadership. In a vote in early December, 55 Tory MPs rebelled fully over Covid restrictions. But in the vote on the lockdown on 6 January, only 14 Tories rebelled fully (12 voting against, plus two tellers).

For a leadership election to take place, 55 Conservative MPs – 15% of the parliamentary party – would have to write a letter demanding one.

Steve Baker
Steve Baker. Photograph: Victoria Jones/PA

Updated

In Scotland there are now 1,829 people in hospital with coronavirus, according to the latest update from the Scottish government. That is 35 more than yesterday, almost 400 more than the total for a week ago today (1,467) and more than 50% up on the total for two weeks ago today (1,174).

There have been 64 more deaths. That is lower than the totals for yesterday (79) and for a week ago today (78).

And there have been 1,707 more cases, with 8.3% of tests providing a positive result. On both counts that is better than yesterday (1,949 cases, 10.2% positivity rate) and than a week ago today (2,649 cases, 11.3% positivity rate).

Here is my colleague Severin Carrell on Richard Leonard’s resignation as Scottish Labour leader.

Richard Leonard quits as Scottish Labour leader: his resignation statement in full

Richard Leonard has announced that he is standing down as Scottish Labour leader. He has just released this statement.

Scotland needs a Labour government now more than ever before. Our National Health Service and public services are at breaking point under the strain of an out-of-control pandemic. Covid is rampant, claiming lives, and striking down so many of our fellow citizens, who are grievously suffering from this awful virus. Workers’ incomes are being squeezed like never before, with job losses rife and businesses going bust. Too many employees go to work day-in and day-out, night-in and night-out leaving them vulnerable to the virus.

Both governments have mishandled its response to Covid, with devastating consequences not least in our care homes. It is essential now that we have an accelerated vaccine rollout – 24 hours a day, 7 days a week – to ensure that the most vulnerable and frontline workers are protected against Covid, and that the general population is given greater protection as quickly as possible after that.

I have thought long and hard over the Christmas period about what this crisis means, and the approach Scottish Labour takes to help tackle it. I have also considered what the speculation about my leadership does to our ability to get Labour’s message across. This has become a distraction.

I have come to the conclusion it is in the best interests of the party that I step aside as leader of Scottish Labour with immediate effect. This was not an easy decision, but after three years I feel it is the right one for me and for the party.

I want to thank all those people who placed their hopes in me, and who worked with me in good times and bad. This experience and the great people I have met will live with me forever. I owe a huge debt in particular to all those party members who work tirelessly for the cause of Labour.

I retain my faith in the Labour party as the party that offers hope to people and that remains the only vehicle for the realisation of that hope. Whilst I step down from the leadership today, the work goes on, and I will play my constructive part as an MSP in winning support for Labour’s vision of a better future in a democratic economy and a socialist society.

Leonard was elected Scottish Labour leader in November 2017 on a broadly Corbynite platform. But he has failed to revive the party in Scotland and has not enjoyed strong backing from Sir Keir Starmer.

Leonard did resist calls for his resignation in the autumn of last year, when Starmer’s ally, Rachel Reeves, openly urged him to consider his position. It is not obvious what has triggered this announcement today, but with the Scottish parliamentary elections taking place this year, his leadership was likely to face renewed scrutiny.

Updated

UK bans arrivals from South America, and Portugal, in bid to keep out Brazilian Covid variant

Grant Shapps, the transport secretary, has just confirmed that arrivals from South America will be banned, from tomorrow, because of concerns about the new Brazilian variant of coronavirus.

As well as Brazil, the ban covers: Argentina, Bolivia, Cape Verde, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay and Venezuela.

And, in a move that was not expected, a ban is also being imposed on arrivals from Portugal, because of its strong travel links with Brazil. Cape Verde, the Atlantic archipelago and former Portuguese colony, has been included too.

There are exemptions for British and Irish nationals, and third country nationals with resident rights in the UK, and for Portuguese hauliers.

Updated

The Welsh Conservatives’ shadow health minister, Andrew RT Davies, accused Welsh Labour of “obsessing” over powers after Mark Drakeford, the first minister, attended the launch of a report calling for “radical federalism”. (See 12.45pm.) Davies posted this on Twitter.

And Delyth Jewell, a Plaid Cymru member of the senedd (MS) said:

These are yesterday’s ideas from yesterday’s party.

Labour had 13 years in power in Westminster to deliver radical devolution for Wales and failed.

They again promised a ‘radical extension of devolution’ in 2017, as did Keir Starmer during his leadership campaign only to now deny Scotland’s right to hold a new referendum on independence.

A broken record won’t save a broken union.

Peter Cast, 87, from Ashtead, getting the AstraZeneca/Oxford Covid-19 vaccine today at Superdrug, at the high street store in Guildford.
Peter Cast, 87, from Ashtead, getting the AstraZeneca/Oxford Covid-19 vaccine today at Superdrug, at the high street store in Guildford. Photograph: Matt Alexander/PA

Secondary school attendance down to 25% in some parts of England before Christmas, report shows

Just one in four pupils attended secondary school in some parts of England before Christmas, according to new analysis showing how Covid-19 was rampaging unchecked.

The Education Policy Institute found that while average school attendance was around 80-85% during last term, there was a steep fall off at the end of December. In the local authorities of Redbridge, Thurrock and Havering in the south of England just 25% of pupils were attending secondary school.

The EPI said attendance patterns changed dramatically in the last week of term, just before Christmas, with average secondary attendance dropping to 72%, driven by the upsurge in infections from mid-December.

The drop was considerable around London and the Thames estuary, with secondary attendance also falling to around 40-45% in Bromley, Enfield and Greenwich and around 35% in Medway and Kent before Christmas.

Luke Sibieta, an EPI research fellow, said:

During this period, the share of secondary pupils absent for Covid-related reasons shot up to 30% or more. This shows just how bad things can get, and how fast, when community infections are surging.

Frustratingly, this data was not made available at the beginning of January – having these figures would have been incredibly informative for the recent debate about whether schools could or should re-open.

The Irish and Scottish governments have published an Ireland-Scotland joint bilateral review (pdf). It includes plans for regular ministerial contacts, a trade taskforce, a conference to address the challenges of rural and coastal communities and cultural exchanges.

Simon Coveney, the Irish foreign minister, said the purpose of the review was to “ensure that the closeness, the cooperation, and the natural connectivity of the Irish-Scottish relationship was strengthened in a changing international environment”.

Quoted in the news release, he also said the report would be “both a platform, on which our relationship will grow; and a map, which will guide that growth”.

Updated

New data from Public Health England shows the proportion of positive tests for Covid-19 declined in the week to 10 January, while hospitalisations, ICU admissions and mortality continued to increase.

According to PHE’s latest Covid surveillance report (pdf), positivity remained high at 13.3% of all pillar 2 tests (tests conducted outside hospitals), but decreased from the previous week, when 17.5% of all tests came back positive.

There was also a decline in the number of confirmed cases, although test results for the most recent week are provisional due to a delay in processing samples.

There was also a 38% rise in the number outbreaks of Covid-19 in care homes, the figures show, with 692 incidents reported in the week to 10 January. The number of outbreaks in care homes has risen for the past five weeks.

Despite government guidance to work from home where possible, the number of coronavirus outbreaks in workplaces also increased by 70%, with 175 incidents reported.

Updated

NHS England records 884 further Covid hospital deaths

NHS England has recorded 884 further coronavirus hospital deaths. The details are here.

This is well below yesterday’s total (1,012). But it is still the second highest daily total for English hospital deaths in this wave of the pandemic, and almost 20% up on the previous highest total for this wave (747 on Tuesday).

Starmer says government has made 'complete mess' of pre-flight tests for arrivals to England

Sir Keir Starmer has criticised the government for delaying the requirement for pre-departure coronavirus tests for people arriving in England from abroad. Speaking on a visit to a mass vaccination centre in Stevenage, he said:

It’s a complete mess again. Priti Patel has talked tough about the borders but other countries have been doing testing for months and months ... I think people will be bewildered and they will feel that we’re exposed – there’s a gap in our defences. We can’t go on like this with delayed decisions not being made in a competent way.

He also said Scottish fishing communities deserved an apology from the government for all the problems they have encountered post Brexit. (See 12.31pm.)

Sir Keir Starmer looks on as Ruby Byers receives the first of two Covid-19 vaccination shots during a visit to the vaccination centre at Robertson House, in Stevenage.
Sir Keir Starmer looks on as Ruby Byers receives the first of two Covid-19 vaccination shots during a visit to the vaccination centre at Robertson House, in Stevenage. Photograph: Leon Neal/PA

Updated

An earlier post said Matt Hancock was announcing that 3 million people had been vaccinated. But he was talking about 3m doses of the vaccine being administered. (See 1.30pm.) Sorry for the mistake.

Updated

No 10 rejects London mayor's claim capital not getting its fair share of vaccine

The Downing Street lobby briefing has just finished. Here are the key points.

  • Ministers met this morning to discuss “urgent measures” to restrict the spread of the Brazilian variant of coronavirus into the UK, the prime minister’s spokesman said. An announcement about a travel ban is expected soon.
  • No 10 rejected claims the Covid vaccines were being distributed unfairly. The spokesman said:

We’ve rolled out the vaccination programme across the country and we’ve ensured that every area receives a fair share of the vaccinations and we will continue to do that.

This was a response to, among others, Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, who has claimed the capital was not getting its fair share. (See 1.38pm.)

We always said we’d introduce the regulations on Friday and the law is still coming into force on Friday. But we’ve implemented a grace period over the weekend until 4am on Monday so passengers can have a little bit more time to ensure they can get access to tests that meet our requirements.

  • No 10 rejected the suggestion from Prof Neil Ferguson that the self-isolation rules should be relaxed for people who have already had Covid. (See 9.52am.) The spokesman said.

We’ve been quite clear that if you’re contacted by test and trace, if you’re a close contact of somebody else who has received a positive test, that you should self-isolate. That hasn’t changed.

  • The spokesman said the government had no plans to introduce so-called vaccine passports - documents giving people who have been vaccinated access to specific services.

Updated

Around 10% of hospital nurses in England are now off work in the areas worst affected by coronavirus, according to NHS data leaked to the Health Service Journal.

The figures put the total absence rate among acute trust nurses at 9.7% as on Monday, up from around 7% at the start of December, although it is unclear exactly how many absences are linked to Covid.

The highest rate was in the east of England, where 11.4% of nurses were off work, with coronavirus accounting for 7.5%, HSJ reported.

Updated

London is not getting its fair share of vaccine, Sadiq Khan, the mayor of the city, has said. In a statement about today’s vaccination figures, Khan said:

I am hugely concerned that Londoners have received only a tenth of the vaccines that have been given across the country. The situation in London is critical with rates of the virus extremely high, which is why it’s so important that vulnerable Londoners are given access to the vaccine as soon as possible.

I have repeatedly called on the government to scale up the vaccine supply, and will be meeting the minister for Covid vaccine deployment [Nadhim Zahawi] today to ensure that we urgently receive an amount of the vaccine that reflects our size, density and the level of need in our city.

Sadiq Khan.
Sadiq Khan. Photograph: Simon Dawson/Reuters

Inside one of the storage units today at the overflow mortuary at Breakspear Crematorium in Ruislip, London which will provide an additional 20% in capacity for public mortuaries in London, helping to relieve pressure on hospitals and council-run morgues.
Inside one of the storage units today at the overflow mortuary at Breakspear Crematorium in Ruislip, London, which will provide an additional 20% in capacity for public mortuaries in London, helping to relieve pressure on hospitals and council-run morgues. Photograph: Jonathan Brady/PA

Updated

This is from Matt Hancock, the health secretary.

UPDATE: Earlier I said Hancock was saying three million people had been vaccinated, but that was wrong because he is talking about three million doses of vaccine having been administered. That is the figure from yesterday - 2.6m first doses and more than 400,000 second doses. Sorry for the error.

Updated

Andy Murray has tested positive for coronavirus before his flight to Melbourne to compete at the Australian Open, putting his presence at the grand slam in doubt, my colleague Tumaini Carayol reports.

Activist and author Naomi Klein says she sees Covid as a teacher that highlights problems with the way we currently live.

Speaking at the Oxford Real Farming Conference last night, Klein said her new short film, “A message from the Future II” was an exercise in “dreaming our way out of this moment and imaging Covid as a teacher”. She said:

That was informed by social movements in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria. We talked about Maria, as a teacher, as a harsh teacher, unveiling and revealing pre-existing crises, but also creating a kind of a roadmap for how we change if we learn these lessons.

The film depicts a future where landscapes are rehabilitated, broken infrastructure is repaired and the cycle of endless consumption is broken. She said:

We end the film with this slogan that no one is sacrificed and everyone is essential. And, of course during this period, the people who were treated as disposable before the pandemic have really been treated as sacrificial during it.

It follows on from last year’s Emmy-nominated short film “A Message From the Future with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez,” which has been viewed more than 12 million times and looks at a potential future if the Green New Deal is pulled off.

Klein said creating the future depicted in the film was a combination of hope and hard work.

It’s not by any means coming out of a spirit of ‘we know that this future is coming’ - it’s not a prophecy. We get it if we earn it. And I think that that’s the message of the film.

Last year Klein told the Guardian editor Katharine Viner that the pandemic had forced us to think more about interdependencies and relationships, and said the recovery must have climate, quality and fairness as its core.

Naomi Klein speaking at the Oxford Real Farming Conference
Naomi Klein speaking at the Oxford Real Farming Conference Photograph: ORFC

Updated

The Scottish government has removed its Covid vaccination plan hours after it was published online, after the UK government raised concerns that the document included sensitive details about vaccine supply.

At her lunchtime briefing, Nicola Sturgeon said that her government had been “seeking to be very transparent ... but the UK government has got some commercial confidentiality concerns about that”.

A UK government source told PA Media:

The reason we didn’t want to publish these figures was because everyone in the world wants these vaccines, and if other countries see how much we are getting they are likely to put pressure on the drug firms to give them some of our allocation.

Yesterday, Scotland’s health secretary, Jeane Freeman, revealed the location of a vaccine store in a Holyrood statement, something a Scottish government spokesperson later told the Sun should not be publicly identified for security reasons and should not be reported.

These mis-steps come after the Scottish government was accused of a “sluggish” initial roll-out of the vaccine and a lack of clarity around how Scotland’s allocation is being used.

Freeman confirmed yesterday a total Scottish vaccine allocation of 562,125 doses. Of those, 365,000 doses have arrived in Scottish vaccination centres or are with health boards or GPs while the rest are either in transit or in storage at an English logistics site.

Questions have been raised about why so many vaccines remain unavailable for immediate use after Freeman halved the target she set in November of vaccinating a million Scots by the end of January.

Before it was removed, the Scottish plan confirmed a series of targets:

  • Over-80s to be vaccinated by first week in February, as well as care home staff, frontline NHS and social care workers (around 250,000 people).
  • All over-70s by mid-February.
  • All over-65s plus clinically extremely vulnerable by the beginning of March.
  • All over-50s and vulnerable younger people by early May.

Sturgeon said today she was unable to give a definitive end date for whole Scottish population being vaccinated because there was a need for greater certainty on actual supply.

Nicola Sturgeon in the Scottish parliament yesterday.
Nicola Sturgeon in the Scottish parliament yesterday. Photograph: Reuters

Updated

North-east and Yorkshire doing best for over-80s vaccinations, and east of England worst, figures show

New figures released by NHS England this morning show differing rates of vaccinations across the different regions.

Almost 2 million people in England received their first dose between 8 December and 10 January. That figure has since risen to 2.25 million as of 12 January but the regional breakdown does not cover the last two days.

London has the lowest proportionate first-dose rollout to date at 2,231 vaccines per 100,000 population rising to 4,309 in the north-east and Yorkshire, close to twice the London rate.

Some of this discrepancy is due to differing population levels among the 80+ age category, one of the highest-priority groups: 3.4% of Londoners are aged 80 and over compared with 5.2% in the north-east and Yorkshire.

Here is a table showing the proportion of all vaccinations compared to 2019 mid-year population figures by NHS region.

% of people, and over-80s, vaccinated in England by region
Percentage of people, and over-80s, vaccinated in England by region Photograph: Guardian

Of the total number of first-dose vaccines administered to 10 January 1.04 million were among those aged 80 or older, meaning 37% of the over-80s population have now received a first dose of the vaccine.

A fifth of those - 374,000 people - have gone on to receive a second dose, bringing the total number of vaccinations administered in England to date to 2.37m doses on that date (rising to 2.67m by 12 January).

The UK needs to reach 2m doses a week if they are to reach the 13.9 million most vulnerable people by 15 February, when the government aims to “offer” a first dose to all those in four most vulnerable categories.

Updated

This is from the BBC’s transport correspondent for London, Tom Edwards.

Break-up of UK 'real and present danger', says Welsh first minister

The Welsh first minister and Labour leader in Wales, Mark Drakeford, has said a “radical redrawing” of the UK is needed to prevent the break-up of the union.

Speaking at the launch of a paper from the Radical Federalism collective setting out the case for “radical federalism”, Drakeford said the issue of the UK’s future constitutional structure was “one of the most important and neglected public policy issues of our time”.

He said “the break-up of the UK is a real and present danger”, arguing that the status quo was no longer viable after the people of Northern Ireland voted against Brexit in the referendum and in the light of the success of the Scottish National party.

Drakeford, however, said: “Independence is a 19th century solution attempting to attach itself to a 20th century problem.”

He said it was up to the Labour party to lead the argument that a “powerful and entrenched devolution settlement in a successful UK” was the way forward. “What we have to create is a new union,” he said.

Mark Drakeford.
Mark Drakeford. Photograph: Ben Evans/Huw Evans/Rex/Shutterstock

Updated

Eustice responds to cross-party barrage of complaints about post-Brexit fishing by blaming 'teething problems'

If Boris Johnson thought he was going to spend the first few weeks of 2021 basking in praise from MPs grateful that Brexit has now finally happened, he will have been disappointed. At the first PMQs of the year yesterday he faces strong complaints about the impact of the deal on Northern Ireland and on fishing communities, this morning the complaints from the DUP are only getting louder (see 10.48am and 11.41am) and this morning George Eustice, the environment secretary, spent a torrid hour or more at the dispatch box in the Commons responding to an urgent question about the impact of the Brexit deal on the fishing industry.

Using exactly the same phrase that Johnson used at PMQs yesterday to play down the Northern Ireland border problems, Eustice said the difficulties faced by people in the fishing industry - including export delays, cancelled contracts, and falling prices, all the result of post-Brexit regulations - were just “teething problems”. He told MPs:

Yesterday we had a meeting with the Dutch officials, earlier this week we had a meeting with the French, on Friday we had a meeting with the Irish to try to iron out some of these teething problems.

They are only teething problems, once people get used to using the paperwork goods will flow normally.

But Eustice’s comments did not seem to impress MPs representing fishing communities, who subjected him to a barrage of complaints. Worryingly for Eustice (and Johnson), these included Tory MPs from the south-west of England and the north-east of Scotland - areas where the Conservatives have won seats partly on the back of Brexit, and where disappointment with the Brexit deal could be electorally perilous.

Steve Double, the Conservative MP for St Austell and Newquay, said:

[Eustice] will be aware that fishermen in Cornwall have been very disappointed with the agreement reached on quota with the EU and the fact that their vessels can still fish in our six to 12-mile limit.

There is real concern that our in-shore fleet, which makes up the vast majority of vessels in my constituency, will benefit little from this deal.

Douglas Ross, leader of the Scottish Conservatives and MP for Moray, said:

I’ve been contacted by many fishermen here in Moray and across Scotland raising their serious concerns and frustrations about the current situation ...

One local skipper ... agreed that I could share his returns from this week. He averages £30 a box from fish he’s landing, and £47 a box from the prawns he’s landing, and that’s half of what he needs to cover his costs.

Anthony Mangnall, the Tory MP for Totnes, said:

The fishermen of Salcombe, Dartmouth and Brixham are now being faced with catch certificates, health certificates, export documentation, all of which is extensive red tape and comes with a cost. So can I ask [Eustice] what his department is doing to reform that system, to improve [and] reduce the bureaucracy?

And Sheryll Murray, the Conservative MP for South East Cornwall (whose former husband was a trawlerman who died at sea), said:

My constituent, Andrew Truss, the owner of Ocean Harvest, is finding that the high cost of border control charges, export health certificates, the need for a fiscal rep in France and the uncertainty his fish will reach the buyer in the EU is posing a real to his business. What compensating measures is the government going to put in place?

In response to this question, and others, Eustice suggested traders would manage much more easily once they were used to the new paperwork.

George Eustice.
George Eustice. Photograph: Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP/Getty Images

Updated

Almost three-quarters of a million people were identified as coming into close contact with someone infected with Covid-19 in the week to 6 January, the latest test and trace figures (pdf) show.

The number of close contacts identified has increased significantly in the last four weeks, according to the Department of Health and Social Care, reaching 736,939 in the most recent week.

The number of people testing positive also reached a record high, with 388,037 people tested positive for Covid-19 in the most recent week. However, due to the lack of widely available testing in the first wave the figure is not easily comparable with earlier stages of the pandemic.

Of contacts identified by test and trace teams, 92.7% were reached and asked to self isolate in the most recent week.

Updated

Northern Ireland at risk of 'major crisis' with food supplies, Stormont minister claims

Northern Ireland faces a “major crisis” with food supplies when the three-month grace period for the new post-Brexit customs rules comes to an end, its agriculture minister has said.

Edwin Poots, a DUP minister in the power-sharing executive, made the claim this morning on the BBC Radio Ulster’s Nolan Show. He said:

It was made very clear to us by the suppliers to both hospitals and schools that if the current arrangement for supermarkets isn’t extended in a few months’ time that they will not be able to supply our hospitals and schools with food.

That is a major crisis and I have raised this with Michael Gove [the Cabinet Office minister].

Seriously, are we going to have a situation where our hospitals and schools are not able to feed the children at school, they’re not able to feed their patients?

That is an outrageous situation that we in Northern Ireland have been put in as a result of the protocol negotiated between the UK government and the European Union.

Under the Northern Ireland protocol, part of the Brexit withdrawal agreement, Northern Ireland remains in the EU’s single market, which means that food supplies going from Britain to Northern Ireland can be subject to checks.

Supermarkets have a three-month grace period before these rules apply in full (and a six-month grace period for chilled meats), but already stores in Northern Ireland are having problems with supplies.

At PMQs yesterday Boris Johnson said these were just “teething problems”.

Edwin Poots.
Edwin Poots. Photograph: Kelvin Boyes/Press Eye/PA

Updated

Around one in five major hospital trusts in England had no spare adult critical care beds on 10 January, NHS England figures show. As PA Media reports, some 27 out of 140 acute trusts reported 100% occupancy of all “open” beds on 10 January - the latest date for which statistics are available.

Updated

In her interview on ITV’s This Morning Priti Patel also said that people should exercise on their own - even though the rules for England allow people to exercise outdoors with one person from another household. She said:

The point to make about any exercise - yes, it should be local, people exercise differently. But exercise on your own and don’t use it for a social meeting.

Priti Patel, the home secretary, has said the government is not planning to tighten lockdown restrictions “today or tomorrow” - suggesting that new measures could be introduced next week. In an interview with ITV’s This Morning, where she was asked whether further restrictions could include a 3-metre social distancing rule or the requirement to wear masks outside, she replied:

The plans are very much to enforce the rules.

This isn’t about new rules coming in, we’re going to stick with enforcing the current measures.

We are not thinking about bringing in new measures today or tomorrow.

Priti Patel on ITV’s ‘This Morning’.
Priti Patel on ITV’s This Morning. Photograph: ITV/Rex/Shutterstock

Updated

Jean Topping, 82, receiving the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine today at the Appleton Village Pharmacy in Widnes.
Jean Topping, 82, receiving the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine today at the Appleton Village Pharmacy in Widnes. Photograph: Jason Cairnduff/Reuters

The University Hospitals Birmingham NHS foundation trust (UHB) has temporarily suspended kidney transplants due to the critical Covid-19 situation in the city. This is from UHB’s renal transplantation team.

Updated

Commenting on today’s NHS England hospital waiting list figures (see 10.12am), Prof Neil Mortensen, president of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, said:

Today’s figures show the calamitous impact of Covid-19 on wait times for operations.

In November, a record number of patients were waiting for hospital treatment. For thousands of people in this country a corrective operation is the best way to relieve debilitating pain and get them back up on their feet, back to work and enjoying life again ...

A huge, hidden waiting list is building up under lockdown. When we eventually emerge from this crisis, we will need sustained investment to treat all those who have been waiting patiently for treatment.

The latest data from NHS England (see 10.12am) this morning indicates that non-Covid services have not been impacted to the same extent as they were in the first wave.

Cancer treatments in November reached or were approaching pre-Covid levels across most categories. As an example, 205,182 people got their first cancer consultation within two weeks of an urgent referral from their GP in November. This is in stark contrast to April and May of this year where just 79,573 and 106,535 people received treatment respectively by that same metric.

A&E attendances fell in November and December, coinciding with a major rise in case numbers and local lockdowns. The December figures show that 61% more patients were treated across English A&Es in December (1,475,710) than at the low point in April (916,581). That said, December still marked the fourth lowest A&E patient count on record.

Brexit deal damaging Northern Ireland's economy, says DUP

Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, the DUP leader at Westminster, has warned that the Good Friday agreement risks being breached as a result of disruption to post-Brexit Irish Sea trade. In an interview on the Today programme about the impact the new border checks are having on supplies to shops in Northern Ireland, he said:

The protocol [which governs the new arrangements] is damaging the Northern Ireland economy and if it damages the Northern Ireland economy it actually undermines the Good Friday agreement.

And furthermore, that agreement makes clear that Northern Ireland will remain an integral part of the United Kingdom unless the people of Northern Ireland vote otherwise.

Therefore this breaches a fundamental element of the Good Friday agreement by increasingly separating Northern Ireland from Great Britain in trading terms - our biggest trading partner, our biggest trading market, and that simply doesn’t help anyone in Northern Ireland.

The DUP backed Brexit, and the Today presenter, Nick Robinson, suggested to Donaldson that it was time to admit that his party got this wrong. But Donaldson would not accept that. He replied:

With respect, the problem is not Brexit because people in Scotland, Wales and England are not experiencing the problems that we’re experiencing here.

Jeffrey Donaldson speaking in the Commons last year.
Jeffrey Donaldson speaking in the Commons last year. Photograph: UK Parliament/Jessica Taylor/PA

Updated

Six pharmacies in England start administering vaccine

High street pharmacies are to begin rolling out Covid vaccines, as the virus death toll across the UK climbed above 100,000. As PA Media reports, Boots and Superdrug branches will be among the sixstores across England that will be able to administer the jabs from today while the government aims to hit its target of vaccinating all people in the four most vulnerable groups by the middle of next month.

Andrews Pharmacy in Macclesfield, Cullimore Chemist in Edgware, north London, Woodside Pharmacy in Telford, and Appleton Village pharmacy in Widnes will be in the first group to hand out the injections, alongside Boots in Halifax, and Superdrug in Guildford.

Those who are eligible for a vaccine will be contacted and invited to make an appointment through a new national booking service.

Pharmacist Andrew Hodgson speaking to Robert Salt, 82, before he receives an injection of the coronavirus vaccine this morning at Andrews Pharmacy in Macclesfield.
Pharmacist Andrew Hodgson speaking to Robert Salt, 82, before he receives an injection of the coronavirus vaccine this morning at Andrews Pharmacy in Macclesfield. Photograph: WPA/Getty Images

Updated

Almost 4.5m people waiting for hospital treatments in England following Covid backlog, latest figures show

NHS England has released its latest hospital waiting figures, and they show that the backlog of people waiting for operations that has been created by the Covid crisis is getting worse. Here are the key figures.

  • A total of 4.46 million people were waiting to start hospital treatment in England at the end of November 2020, the highest number since records began. As PA Media reports, this compares with 4.42 million in November 2019 and 4.45 million in October that year - the previous highest number in the data which goes back to August 2007.
  • Almost 200,000 people had been waiting more than a year for an operation in November, the figures show. The November total, 192,169, is the highest figure for year-long waits since May 2008. In November 2019 the number having to wait more than 52 weeks to start treatment stood at just 1,398.
  • The total number of people admitted for routine treatment in hospitals in England was down 27% in November compared with a year ago. Some 222,810 patients were admitted for treatment during the month, down from 303,193 in November 2019.

Updated

Covid expert suggests relaxing self-isolation rules for people who have already had virus

Currently people who come into contact with someone who has tested positive for coronavirus have to isolate, even if they have had the virus. But new research showing that people who recover from Covid have a similar level of protection against future infection as those who receive a vaccine, at least for the first five months, may justify changing the self-isolation rules, Prof Neil Ferguson said this morning.

Ferguson, the Imperial College epidemiologist whose modelling helped to trigger first lockdown, told the Today programme:

Those people who have had the virus before are at less risk of getting infected and cumulatively slow the spread.

What it means for individuals is harder to say. We have a real problem at the moment, for instance with healthcare workers - a lot of healthcare workers getting infected and off work.

Whether we can relax restrictions temporarily on requirements for isolation for people who have had a positive PCR test in the last few months is a question for policy makers but it could ease pressures on, for instance, the health service.

Neil Ferguson.
Neil Ferguson. Photograph: Reuters

Updated

Even though the UK government has delayed the introduction of compulsory pre-flight tests for international arrivals to England until Monday, on BBC Breakfast this morning John Swinney, the Scottish deputy first minister, stressed that this rule was already in force in Scotland. He said:

The position in Scotland is that those restrictions are in place and we want to see people following those restrictions to make sure that we minimise the risk.

A temporary mortuary that was set up in a former aircraft hangar at the start of the pandemic is now in use, PA Media reports.

The facility at the former RAF Coltishall base, north-east of Norwich, was not required during the first wave of coronavirus but is now being used by the Norfolk and Norwich University hospital (NNUH).

Tom McCabe, chairman of Norfolk’s Covid-19 strategic co-ordination group, said:

It was always anticipated that during challenging periods there would be extra pressures on mortuaries, undertakers and crematoria.

This temporary mortuary provides additional capacity to help make sure the county’s hospitals have enough flexibility of space in their own mortuaries, and to ensure we can provide the most respectful and dignified way to look after both those who have died, and their families, over this difficult period.

Updated

Pharmacist Andrew Hodgson speaks to Robert Salt, 82, before he receives an injection of the coronavirus vaccine at Andrews Pharmacy in Macclesfield, Cheshire. Its one of six high street pharmacies across England that have begun administering the vaccine.
Pharmacist Andrew Hodgson speaks to Robert Salt, 82, before he receives an injection of the coronavirus vaccine at Andrews Pharmacy in Macclesfield, Cheshire. Its one of six high street pharmacies across England that have begun administering the vaccine. Photograph: Peter Byrne/PA

Daily death figures likely to stay at high levels 'for some weeks', says Vallance

Good morning. Yesterday Britain passed a grim milestone, as the number of people who have died with coronavirus in the UK passed 100,000 and the daily figure for recorded deaths reached a new all-time high, at 1,564. Sir Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser, was asked about the figures in an interview on ITV’s Peston last night. On the plus side, he said that there was evidence that the lockdown measures were working and that coronavirus cases numbers were starting to come down. He told the programme:

I think the existing restrictions ... are making a difference and you can see that. What we know now - that we didn’t know a few weeks ago - was, would these sorts of restrictions be enough to bring this virus under control with the new variant? And the answer is yes. It looks like it is and things are flattening off, at least in some places.

But Vallance also said that high daily death numbers were going to continue “for some weeks”. He said:

When you look at the number of infections we’ve had over the past few weeks and how this is likely to continue ... I’m afraid we’re in a period of high death numbers that’s going to carry on for some weeks.

It’s not going to come down quickly even if the measures that are in place now start to reduce the infection numbers. So we’re in for a pretty grim period, I’m afraid.

It has been a relatively quiet morning so far. The UK government is being criticised for announcing last night that the law requiring international arrivals to England to have a negative test will come into force on Monday, not on Friday as originally planned. My colleague Matthew Weaver has this story.

And today Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, is due to chair a meeting that is expected to approve a ban on flights from Brazil. My colleague Heather Stewart has the story here.

Here is the agenda for the day.

9.30am: The ONS publishes figures on the economic impact of coronavirus.

9.30am: NHS England publishes its latest hospital waiting time figures.

10.30am: An environment minister responds to a Commons urgent question about the impact of Brexit on the fishing industry.

11am: NHS test and trace publishes its weekly performance figures.

12pm: Downing Street is expected to hold its daily lobby briefing.

12.15pm: Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, holds her daily coronavirus briefing.

2pm: Public Health England publishes its 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.

Updated

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