Afternoon summary
- The Labour MP Dawn Butler has been ordered to leave the Commons chamber for the rest of the day after saying that Boris Johnson has lied “over and over again” about coronavirus. (See 4.07pm.)
That’s all from me for today. But our coronavirus coverage continues on our global live blog. It’s here.
Scotland has recorded its highest daily Covid fatalities figure since March, after NHS figures showed that 22 deaths of people with confirmed Covid infections were recorded in the past 24 hours.
That brings the death toll of those who died within 28 days of a positive Covid test to 7,842. The latest fatalities figure comes after a sustained drop in detected infections: 1,825 people tested positive in the past 24 hours.
Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister, said the latest fatalities figure was a reminder that increases in hospital admissions and deaths tended to lag days or weeks behind rises in positive cases.
Reminding people to get vaccinated and to remember physical distancing and other restrictions, she tweeted:
1/ Cases continue to fall in 🏴 (positivity today down to 6%) - 🙏 to everyone helping achieve this. However, there’s always a lag before we see hospital admissions and deaths reduce too. A further 22 deaths reminds us of toll virus can take - my condolences go to those grieving https://t.co/6k77XQUfvq
— Nicola Sturgeon (@NicolaSturgeon) July 22, 2021
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Northern Ireland delays decision on relaxing Covid rules until next week
Northern Ireland’s executive has delayed a decision on relaxing Covid-19 rules until next week, when ministers will be able to review fresh health data.
The Stormont executive had been expected today to approve the reopening of theatres and concert halls with social distancing on 26 July but deferred the decision, keeping the region on a more cautious track than the rest of the UK.
The power-sharing executive did relax restrictions on activities considered low risk. From 26 July 15 people from unlimited households can meet outdoors and close contact services such as hairdressers can operate without pre-booked appointments.
Ministers will meet again next week to decide about theatres and live indoor events, and also whether to extend the limit on indoor gatherings from six to 10 people. They will also review the obligation to wear masks in places of worship.
Democratic Unionist party (DUP) leaders want Northern Ireland to follow England’s lead and open up faster but the other four parties in the executive – Ulster Unionists, Alliance, Sinn Fein and the SDLP – prefer a slower pace in light of rising infection levels.
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This House of Commons library document includes a list of other occasions when MPs have been ordered to leave the chamber for disorderly conduct, or for saying something unacceptable about another MP, since 1992. The former Labour MP Dennis Skinner features on the list four times, once for calling a minister a “little squirt”.
The Press Association has filed a longer account of what happened when Labour’s Dawn Butler was ordered to leave the Commons chamber for calling Boris Johnson a liar.
Butler highlighted questionable claims by Johnson, including his recent assertion that the link between Covid cases and deaths had been “severed”, rather than just severely weakened. She went on:
It’s dangerous to lie in a pandemic.
I am disappointed the prime minister has not come to the House to correct the record and correct the fact that he has lied to the House and the country over and over again.
Judith Cummins, the temporary deputy speaker, intervened, saying:
Order! Order! I’m sure that the member will reflect on her words she’s saying and perhaps correct the record.
Butler replied:
What would you rather – a weakened leg or a severed leg?
At the end of the day the prime minister has lied to this House time and time again.
It’s funny that we get in trouble in this place for calling out the lie rather than the person lying.
Cummins intervened again and urged Butler to “reflect” on her words and withdraw them. Butler replied:
I’ve reflected on my words and somebody needs to tell the truth in this house that the prime minister has lied.
Cummins then read out a statement in which she ordered Butler to “withdraw immediately from the House for the remainder of the day’s sitting”. Butler complied, and left the chamber.
Cummins has been serving as a temporary deputy speaker this week in place of Rosie Winterton, who is having to isolate.
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If you are looking for some good books to read over holidays, you should read the Publishers Association’s list of summer book recommendations from parliamentarians and political journalists. It’s a good list, and it’s here (pdf). The press release is worth a read too, mostly for its use of the word quasquicentennial (125th anniversary). Boris Johnson is one of the contributors to the list, and he has chosen Evelyn Waugh’s journalism satire, Scoop. This essay, by Robert Hutton in the July edition of the Critic, explains why that is such an appropriate choice.
Alternatively, you could read Gordon Brown’s Seven Ways to Change the World, one of the best new political books that has landed on my desk in recent months and a reminder of what it is like to have political leaders who think deeply, with knowledge and creativity and moral urgency, about the biggest problems facing the world. It is an inspiring book, and an easier read than you might expect, even though the passages on global financial regulation are probably not what you would save for the beach. William Davies reviewed it well for the Guardian here.
The Brown book is not a memoir, but it does also contain this snippet about the Blair government, and its relationship with the Bush administration, which is newish to me, and worth flagging up. Brown writes:
In the early 2000s, Prime Minister Blair and President Bush discussed in private how the UK-US relationship might evolve. But what came forward from the Americans was something no British leader could be comfortable with: the possibility of the UK joining the US security apparatus as some kind of associate member, with the UK sitting alongside the president and vice-president, the National Security Council, the FBI, the CIA and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. If this initiative had become known, there would have been a public outcry amid allegations that the UK was being treated not just as the 51st state but as a sixth agency. None of this transpired and the tried and tested system of high-level intelligence-sharing continues in its traditional form: for example, within the Five Eyes collaboration that includes Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the US and the UK.
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The UK has recorded 39,906 new coronavirus cases, and 84 new deaths, according to the latest update to the government’s coronavirus dashboard. Week on week, cases are still going up. But today the week-on-week rate of increase (the total for the last seven days, compared to the total for the previous seven days) is 24.2%, compared to 35.8% yesterday, suggesting the rate of increase is starting to slow.
But deaths are up by 50.6% week on week.
Labour MP Dawn Butler ordered to leave Commons chamber for saying Johnson has lied 'over and over again'
The Labour MP Dawn Butler has been ordered to leave the House of Commons for the rest of the day after refusing to withdraw claims that Boris Johnson has “lied to the house and the country over and over again”.
Butler was told to withdraw from the chamber by temporary deputy speaker Judith Cummins following her remarks in a Commons debate. Under parliamentary rules, MPs are not supposed to accuse each other of lying in the chamber.
Butler said:
Poor people in our country have paid with their lives because the prime minister has spent the last 18 months misleading this house and the country over and over again.
Highlighting questionable claims by the PM, Butler said:
It’s dangerous to lie in a pandemic.
I am disappointed the prime minister has not come to the house to correct the record and correct the fact that he has lied to the house and the country over and over again.
No prime minister in the modern era has been accused of lying as much as Johnson. Earlier this year Peter Oborne, who worked as political editor at the Spectator when Johnson was its editor, published a whole book about Johnson’s lying in which he said: “I have never encountered a senior British politician who lies and fabricates so regularly, so shamelessly and so systematically as Boris Johnson.”
And Dominic Cummings, Johnson’s former chief adviser, recently published an essay saying that Johnson “lies – so blatantly, so naturally, so regularly – that there is no real distinction possible with him, as there is with normal people, between truth and lies”.
UPDATE: Here is the clip.
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Victims of Post Office miscarriage of justice scandal offered interim compensation payments of up to £100,000
Interim compensation payments worth up to £100,000 will be offered to post office operators who were wrongly convicted as part of the Horizon scandal, the postal affairs minister, Paul Scully, has announced today.
These payments will not stop victims bringing civil claims through the courts. The Post Office is proposing to offer final compensation through the alternative dispute resolution arrangements.
Scully said:
The suffering and distress these postmasters and their families have gone through cannot be overstated.
While nothing will make up for the years of pain they faced after this appalling injustice, I hope this initial step provides a measure of comfort.
The Post Office has started to turn a corner in terms of dealing with its past mistakes – and this government will support them in doing so wherever possible.
Hundreds of people may have been wrongly prosecuted in the course of the Horizon scandal, which involved operators being falsely accused of theft because of defects with the Post Office’s Horizon accounting system.
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Further to Nadhim Zahawi’s announcement (see 12.27pm) that UK nationals vaccinated overseas will be able to have their status authenticated, a reader got in touch to make the point that the stipulation of having to see a UK GP first makes it useless for most people.
Many of the affected group will be people living permanently in other countries, and thus without a GP in the UK. In fact, many EU countries’ health systems require people to de-register from their domestic health service.
The Department of Health and Social Care said it realises this is an issue, and that people in that situation will need to wait for the proposed mutual recognition of vaccination status between 30-plus countries, a process that is ongoing but – officials hope – will be concluded soon.
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CBI calls for urgent change to isolation rules, saying current system 'closing down economy rather than opening it up'
The CBI, the leading organisation representing major employers in the UK, has joined those groups calling for an urgent change to the isolation rules for contacts of people testing positive.
In response to the latest figures showing more than 600,000 people in England and Wales pinged in a week (see 11.02am), Tony Danker, the CBI director general, said in a statement:
The current approach to self-isolation is closing down the economy rather than opening it up. This is surely the opposite of what the government intended. Businesses have exhausted their contingency plans and are at risk of grinding to a halt in the next few weeks.
What is now needed is a well-balanced approach to reopening the economy, rather than the awkward compromise that currently exists.
We can end the pingdemic by bringing forward [from 16 August] the date by which all those who have been double-jabbed no longer need to self-isolate if not infectious and introducing a test & release scheme.
Danker also said it was important for firms to have access to an “effective, accessible testing regime”.
One in seven people transferred to the test and trace system after testing positive for Covid-19 were not reached in the latest week, PA Media reports. PA says:
It is the largest proportion not reached since October last year and comes as the number of people testing positive rose to its highest total for nearly six months.
Some 14.2% of people transferred to test and trace in England in the week ending 14 July were not reached, according to the latest weekly figures (pdf) from the Department of Health and Social Care.
The figure has not been this high since the week ending 21 October 2020, early in the second wave of coronavirus, when it stood at 14.5%.
Boris Johnson has spoken to Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, this afternoon, No 10 has said. The two leaders spoke about the recent floods in Germany, and the importance of tackling climate change, but, judging by the No 10 readout, the call was largely about the Northern Ireland protocol. According to Downing Street, Johnson told Merkel what he told Ursula von der Leyen earlier (see 12.32pm) about how he believed solutions to the problems that have arisen “could not be found through the existing mechanisms of the protocol”.
No 10 went on:
[Johnson] urged the chancellor and the EU collectively to engage in a constructive and detailed discussion on the UK’s proposals.
Public Health England has just published its latest weekly Covid surveillance report (pdf).
The report covers the week ending Sunday 18 July. It says in that week “case rates increased in all age groups, regions and ethnic groups”.
This week's #COVID19 surveillance report shows case rates continue to be highest in those aged 20-29 years old.
— Public Health England (@PHE_uk) July 22, 2021
Read the full report here: https://t.co/FCcjHmBd7v pic.twitter.com/8Fzs4wxZFu
Our weekly #COVID19 surveillance report also shows that case rates continue to be highest in the North East.
— Public Health England (@PHE_uk) July 22, 2021
Read it here: https://t.co/FCcjHmBd7v pic.twitter.com/Y25Bt9k1dU
Hospitalisations were also going up in the week ending 18 July, the report says.
Government uses new powers to order Stormont executive to commission abortion services for Northern Ireland
Brandon Lewis, the Northern Ireland secretary, has used new powers to direct the Stormont executive to commission abortion services in Northern Ireland, PA Media reports. PA says:
Lewis confirmed the widely-anticipated move in a written ministerial statement to parliament.
Abortion laws in Northern Ireland were liberalised in 2019 following legislation passed by Westminster at a time when devolution in the region had collapsed.
However, while individual health trusts are currently offering services on an ad hoc basis, the Department of Health has yet to centrally commission the services due to an ongoing impasse within the executive.
In March, the government intervened to hand Lewis new powers to direct the region’s Department of Health to commission the services.
Today he formally took that step, directing the Department of Health and the first and deputy first ministers to commission the services no later than March 31, 2020.
In his statement Lewis said:
I remain extremely disappointed that full commissioning proposals have not yet been brought forward by the Department of Health and that the executive has not an opportunity to discuss them. This ongoing stalemate leaves me no choice but to issue a direction. I have a legal and moral obligation to ensure the women and girls in Northern Ireland are afforded their rights and can access the healthcare as set out in the 2020 regulations.
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No 10 says no extra money going to NHS to fund 3% pay increase
Here are the main points from the No 10 lobby briefing.
- Downing Street has said that no extra money will be available to the NHS to fund the 3% pay rise for most staff announced yesterday. A No 10 spokesman said the pay rise would be “funded from within the NHS budget”, but he said this would not affect funding already earmarked for the NHS front line.
- No 10 has renewed its claim that the EU has been taking a “purist” approach to the Northern Ireland protocol. Asked why the UK was effectively trying to renegotiate a deal it agreed last year, the spokesman said:
We did not expect the EU to take such a purist approach when it came to implementing the Northern Ireland protocol.
But, when challenged to say if the UK was accusing the EU of breaching the terms of the agreement, the spokesman would not go as far as making the claim.
Doubtless in the EU they would argue that what No 10 describes as a “purist” approach to implementing the agreement just means: implementing the agreement.
- The spokesman said that the government was launching a consultation today on slashing “Brexit red tape”. But, when asked if this meant that the government was accepting that Brexit caused red tape, the spokesman did not accept this, and the news release about the initiative suggests this is more a case of careless phrasing than an admission that Brexit has increased the regulatory burden (even though for exporters it has). That is because of how No 10 describes the consultation, which follows on from the publication of the report by the independent Taskforce on Innovation, Growth and Regulatory Reform (TIGRR). No 10 said in its news release:
For the first time in a generation, the UK has the freedom to make and implement rules that put British businesses and consumers first – freeing businesses from overbearing bureaucracy and reducing costs for consumers, whilst boosting competition, innovation and growth across the economy ...
This includes looking at ways to dispense with unnecessary red tape that no longer meets the UK’s needs, including those the UK inherited when it was a former member of the EU – for example reintroducing a way to ‘offset’ new regulations, like the one-in-two-out method whereby to introduce a new regulation, unnecessary regulations would need to be removed.
To enable innovative companies to trial groundbreaking ideas safely, the government could also look to make more use and impact of ‘sandboxes’, where certain regulations are lifted to test new products in a real-world setting, under the regulator’s supervision – this was another reform recommended by TIGRR.
Another TIGRR proposal to move away from the EU’s excessive use of the ‘precautionary principle’ inherited in the UK and adopt a ‘proportionality principle’ in our regulatory framework has been set out. This would mean regulation is reset to focus on outcomes, not process, and be proportionate to the issues and impacts on businesses and people.
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And this is what Downing Street said about Boris Johnson’s call with the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, about the Northern Ireland protocol this morning. (See 12.21pm.) A No 10 spokesman said:
The prime minister set out that the way the protocol was currently operating was unsustainable. Solutions could not be found through the existing mechanisms of the protocol. That was why we had set out proposals for significant changes to it.
He urged the EU to look at those proposals seriously and work with the UK on them. There is a huge opportunity to find reasonable, practical solutions to the difficulties facing people and businesses in Northern Ireland, and thereby to put the relationship between the UK and the EU on a better footing. They agreed to remain in touch.
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People vaccinated abroad should be able to have their jabs accepted for Covid passes from end of this month, MPs told
UK nationals who had their vaccinations overseas and find themselves unable to register for domestic Covid passes, or obtain other double-jabbed benefits like avoiding quarantine when returning from amber-list countries, should see this change soon, Nadhim Zahawi has said.
Asked about the issue in the Commons by Labour’s Rupa Huq, Zahawi, the vaccine deployment minister for England, said:
In terms of UK nationals who have been vaccinated overseas, by the end of this month they’ll be able to talk to their GP, go through what vaccine they’ve had, and have it registered with the NHS as being vaccinated.
The contact with a GP was necessary to ensure their vaccine was one of those approved for use in the UK, Zahawi added.
He also said moves were afoot for reciprocal recognition of 33 other countries’ vaccination proof schemes, so non-UK nationals jabbed overseas could also have the benefits. This “will happen very soon”, he added.
Updated
Von der Leyen tells Johnson EU will not renegotiate Northern Ireland protocol
Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, has reaffirmed the EU’s intention not to renegotiate the Northern Ireland protocol. She posted this on Twitter after a call with Boris Johnson on the topic.
PM @BorisJohnson called to present the UK Command paper on the Irish/Northern Irish Protocol.
— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) July 22, 2021
The EU will continue to be creative and flexible within the Protocol framework. But we will not renegotiate.
We must jointly ensure stability and predictability in Northern Ireland.
Her language is almost identical to what her colleague Maroš Šefčovič said yesterday when he issued the EU’s first formal response to the government’s publication of its command paper on the protocol.
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Public consent for test and trace in England at risk, says Jeremy Hunt
The government “risks losing social consent” for its test and trace programme if it does not immediately allow fully vaccinated people to avoid isolation, the former health secretary Jeremy Hunt has said. My colleague Aubrey Allegretti has the story here.
In a written ministerial statement, Grant Shapps, the transport secretary, has announced the government is going to review its long-term plans for major road and rail schemes (its “national policy statement for national networks”) in the light of the pandemic, and how that might change transport use. He said:
Trends already under way in homeworking, online shopping, and videoconferencing, all of which had reduced trip rates even before the pandemic, have dramatically increased, and seem unlikely to be fully reversed. Against that, though, must be set the effects on road demand of the hopefully temporary move away from public transport during the crisis; of increases in delivery traffic; and potentially of increases in driving when electric and autonomous vehicles become common.
The current National Policy Statement (NPS) on National Networks, the government’s statement of strategic planning policy for major road and rail schemes, was written in 2014 – before the government’s legal commitment to net zero, the 10-point plan for a green industrial revolution, the new sixth carbon budget and most directly the new, more ambitious policies outlined in the transport decarbonisation plan.
While the NPS continues to remain in force, it is right that we review it in the light of these developments, and update forecasts on which it is based to reflect more recent, post-pandemic conditions, once they are known.
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Northern Ireland protocol 'wasn’t something that was going to last forever', says Kwarteng
As my colleague Jennifer Rankin reports in her analysis of the UK government’s command paper on the Northern Ireland protocol published yesterday, the EU is exasperated by Boris Johnson’s objection to complying with a deal that he agreed only last year.
EU leaders may be even more unhappy when they hear how Kwasi Kwarteng, the business secretary, described the protocol in an interview this morning. Speaking on Sky News, Kwarteng, a strong supporter of Brexit in 2016, claimed the protocol was always intended to be flexible. He said:
A deal is a deal but it wasn’t something that was going to last forever.
Nobody thought the Northern Ireland protocol was going to define the role of Northern Ireland within the UK forevermore, it was something that was flexible.
You’ll remember two years ago people said we were never going to get a deal from the EU but we did so.
When people say they’re not going to look at the protocol again, I say ‘well, let’s just see’.
Updated
According to the latest weekly test and trace figures (pdf), 259,265 people in England tested positive for coronavirus between 8 July and 14 July - a 33% increase compared to the previous week. That is the highest weekly figure since the week ending 20 January.
The figures also show that 475,465 people were identified as close contacts of people testing positive between 8 July and 14 July - a 25% increase on the previous week.
Back in the Commons Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, asked Nadhim Zahawi, the vaccine deployment minister, if the government was confident it had enough PCR testing capacity, with new cases expected to reach 100,000 per day this summer.
Referring to PCR capacity, Zahawi replied: “It’s 640,000 per day as of the latest data I looked at.”
Up to a quarter of staff at some food and drink firms are isolating because they have been pinged, according to Ian Wright, chief executive of the Food and Drink Federation. He told Sky News:
I think the situation is concerning and it’s up and down the supply chain.
It’s not consistent across the country – there are some places where shops and factories are working perfectly normally and in other parts manufacturers are under extreme pressure to continue producing because they may have up to 25% of their staff off.
This is partly as a result of structural labour shortages but increasingly the cause is pinging, and it’s getting worse, there is no question about that.
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Fraud and hacking soared during the pandemic as criminals “took advantage of behavioural changes”, while reports of domestic abuse-related offences also rose, PA Media reports. PA says:
Lockdowns and restrictions in movement in England and Wales saw a surge in online shopping which led to “substantial increases” in computer crimes, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
Action Fraud, the national fraud and cybercrime reporting centre, reported a 28% rise in fraud offences, from 312,035 in 2019-20 to 398,022 in 2020-21.
The data showed a 57% increase in “online shopping and auctions” fraud in the latest year (from 62,509 to 97,927 offences) and a 44% increase in “financial investment fraud” (from 14,024 to 20,260 offences), the ONS said.
The National Fraud Intelligence Bureau also reported a 55% increase in “hacking – personal” offences referred by Action Fraud (from 3,481 to 5,390 offences).
Updated
The businessman Lex Greensill was given “extraordinarily privileged” access to government while the government’s process for managing lobbying is insufficiently transparent and allows access to a “privileged few”, a report into the Greensill lobbying scandal commissioned by the prime minister has concluded. My colleague Rajeev Syal has the story here.
More than 600,000 people pinged in England and Wales, latest weekly figures show
NHS figures show that a record 618,903 alerts were sent to users of the NHS Covid-19 app in England and Wales in the week to 14 July telling them they had been in close contact with someone who had tested positive for coronavirus, PA Media reports.
Jo Churchill, the public health minister, has been pinged, she has revealed on Twitter.
I have been pinged by the COVID-19 app & I’m therefore self-isolating. It’s so important we all play our part to fight Coronavirus, isolation and vaccination are vital to helping stop the spread and protect everyone. If you haven’t yet been vaccinated, get the jab.💉
— Jo Churchill MP (@Jochurchill4) July 22, 2021
Zahawi says showing Covid pass could in future be made compulsory for access to large events
Zahawi says the country has taken a step forward this week, with the move to step 4 in England.
But he says people need to be cautious.
Today a new campaign is being launched encouraging people to carry on taking steps to stay safe, like wearing masks in crowded places, ensuring rooms are well ventilated, and getting tested regularly.
He says, after a successful trial, the government has rolled out the NHS Covid pass. This allows people to demonstrate their Covid status, whether proof of vaccination, test results or natural immunity. Anyone can access this through the NHS app, the NHS website or by calling 119 and asking for a letter, he says. He says venues can use this as a condition of entry.
And if large numbers of people are likely to go to a venue or event, then organisers should use the pass, he says. He says the government reserves the right to make its use compulsory in the future.
He also confirms that MPs will get a vote on the plans to use Covid passports.
He says new data suggests the vaccination programme has prevented 52,000 hospitalisations. The protection offered by the vaccine wall is getting stronger, he says.
He confirms that the government intends to go ahead with making being vaccinated a condition for entry to nightclubs from September.
UPDATE: Here is the direct quote from Zahawi.
This week, after a successful trial, we have rolled out the NHS Covid pass. This allows people safely and securely to demonstrate their Covid status, whether it is proof of vaccination status, test results, or natural immunity.
People will also be able to demonstrate proof of a negative test result. Although we don’t encourage its use in essential settings like supermarkets, other businesses and organisations in England can adopt the pass as a means of entry where it is suitable for their venue or premises when they can see its potential to keep their clients or their customers safe.
For proprietors of venues and events where large numbers are likely to gather and likely to mix with people from outside their households for prolonged periods, deploying the pass is the right thing to do.
The pass has an important role to play in slowing the spread of the virus and so we reserve the right to mandate its use in the future.
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Nadhim Zahawi's statement to MPs on coronavirus
Nadhim Zahawi, the vaccine deployment minister, is about to make a statement to MPs on coronavirus.
But before he starts Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, says he was surprised a health minister, Helen Whately, made a statement to MPs yesterday without confirming the pay rise for NHS staff. He says the Commons should have been told first.
Zahawi apologises for what happened.
He refers to the department’s “inability” to make a statement yesterday. But he does not explain why Whately did not mention the pay rise.
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The Road Haulage Association says lorry drivers should be included in the list of critical workers allowed to use testing as an alternative to isolation coming out today. Referring to shortages in shops, partly caused by drivers not being available, Rod McKenzie, the RHA’s managing director of policy, said:
We’re in this pickle because the government says a small number of essential workers are exempt from isolating if they’ve been double-jabbed and test negative, but what is essential?
At the beginning of the pandemic it was very clear that lorry drivers were essential workers, but in this latest advice it’s not clear.
Are we essential? Of course we’re essential. Does the government think we’re essential? We don’t know.
And another food industry executive told the Today programme this morning that he is telling staff told to isolate by the NHS Covid app to take a test and carry on working if they are negative.
This is contrary to government advice, which is that people pinged by the app should isolate.
Andrew Selley, chief executive of Bidfood, a food distribution company, said that he considered his staff critical workers. He told the programme:
We know that they’re critical workers as part of the food supply chain, so if people are obviously positive or contacted by test and trace then they will have to isolate.
If they are pinged we ask them to take a PCR test, if that’s positive then clearly they’ll isolate, but if it’s negative we ask them to come back to work and we have a process of doing lateral flow tests daily away from their workplace, and if that’s negative they can proceed with their work.
When it was put to him that this policy was contrary to government advice, Selley replied:
We think that’s appropriate and safe. The ping is advisory.
We operate in Covid-safe workplaces and we’re absolutely key workers in terms of the supply chain to hospitals, care homes, prisons, and therefore it’s important for us to be able to keep offering that service to our customers.
As PA Media reports, Selley said 100 staff from around 20 depots across the country were off isolating yesterday, presenting a “real challenge” with deliveries arriving late, or even the next day.
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Richard Walker, managing director of the supermarket firm Iceland, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme this morning that although there is not a widespread problem with food shortages in stores now, the problem could soon get worse unless the government addresses the “pingdemic”. He said:
The dramatic pictures that you might have seen in the media are isolated incidents and not widespread.
But the people who should be panicking are the government, and I believe that, you know, the sooner they clear up this mess, and get retail workers and HGV drivers on to the key worker list, the better.
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Kwarteng says 'narrow' list of critical workers exempt from isolation rules out today, implying shops not included
Good morning. On Monday Boris Johnson said that some critical workers would be allowed to use testing as an alternative to isolation after contact with someone testing positive, to save them from the “pingdemic”. But he refused to give details. No 10 said a bit more at lobby on Tuesday, but at PMQs yesterday Sir Keir Starmer said he had read the briefing several times and “I haven’t a clue what it means”.
This morning Kwasi Kwarteng, the business secretary, was doing the morning interview round for No 10 and he said that today guidance will be published saying which critical workers will be exempt from the current isolation rules. He said:
We’re looking at different sectors and we will be publishing today the sectors that will be affected.
But, when asked on the Today programme if the food industry would be exempt, he refused to say. And earlier, in an interview on BBC Breakfast, he said the list of people exempt would be “very narrow”. He said:
The list, I think, will be quite narrow, it will be very narrow, simply because we don’t want to get into a huge debate about who is exempt.
If the food industry is not included on the critical workers list, retailers will be disappointed. With supermarkets under increasing pressure, partly because of the pingdemic, to keep their shelves stocked, retailers want an exemption. Helen Dickinson, chief executive of the British Retail Consortium, told BBC Breakfast this morning:
There will be many smaller businesses where if they only have one or two staff and they need to self-isolate, then that’s them needing to close their doors completely ...
I think what the most important thing for government to do is to recognise that the current situation is untenable ...
Either those [self-isolation] rules need to change or something else in the wall of defences against the virus needs to be considered.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: The ONS publishes the latest quarterly crime figures for England and Wales.
10.30am: Nadhim Zahawi, the vaccine deployment minister, makes a statement to MPs.
11am: NHS test and trace publishes its latest performance figures.
After 1.30pm: MPs begin a backbench debate on the public administration and constitutional affairs committee report (pdf) making recommendations for the Covid inquiry.
2pm: Public Health England publishes its latest weekly Covid surveillance report.
Politics Live has been a mix of Covid and non-Covid news recently and that will probably be the case today. For more coronavirus developments, do follow our global Covid 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.
Alternatively, you can email me at andrew.sparrow@theguardian.com
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