Afternoon summary
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Boris Johnson has announced that the government is setting up an antivirals taskforce to help develop medicines to protect people from coronavirus.
Speaking at a Downing Street press conference, he said wanted antivirals to be available by the autumn. Explaining what this might mean, he said:
This means, for example, that if you test positive there might be a tablet you could take at home to stop the virus in its tracks and significantly reduce the chance of infection turning into more severe disease. Or if you’re living with someone who has tested positive, there might be a pill you could take for a few days to stop you getting the disease yourself.
Johnson said nothing in the current data suggested that the government would not be able to carry on lifting restrictions as planned, with the next major relaxation of rules due on 17 May. But he also stressed that a third wave of coronavirus cases was expected.
I see nothing in the data now that makes me think we are going to have to deviate in any way from the roadmap cautious but irreversible that we have set out.
But the majority of scientific opinion in this country is still firmly of the view that there will be another wave of Covid at some stage this year.
- He said 60% of 45- to 49-year-olds have now been vaccinated.
- He hinted that if the government does introduce Covid-status certificates, as expected, their use will be relatively limited. In response to a question, he stressed that people would not need them from 17 May. And he went on:
What we are looking at – I think any responsible government would look at - is what ways we can use people’s evidence of Covid status just to open up some of those things that are really tough and did prove very tough to open last year
- He rejected claims that the government should have put India on the red list earlier, saying that it has only now been put on the red list as a precaution. He said:
What we’re seeing in India is a result of a variant under investigation, it hasn’t yet been deemed a variant of concern – I think that was why there has been the delay. I think what the JBC (Joint Biosecurity Centre) has decided is on a purely precautionary basis it’s necessary now to put India on the red list.
I want to stress that even before that we have measures in place for everybody coming from India that are very, very tough indeed.
- He said football clubs should not be treated as mere “international brands” with no links to communities. Speaking about the proposed European super league, he said:
Football was invented and codified in this county. It is one of the great glories of this country’s cultural heritage. These clubs, these names, originate from famous towns and cities in our country. I don’t think that it is right that they should be somehow dislocated from their home towns, home cities, taken and turned into international brands and commodities that just circulate the planet propelled by the billions of banks without any reference to fans and to those who have loved them all their lives.
Johnson confirmed that he was willing to use legislation to block the super league plan. (See 5.21pm.) But he would not elaborate on what this legislation might involve.
- He claimed that he had acted with honesty and integrity in his affair with Jennifer Arcuri. HuffPost’s Paul Waugh asked a lengthy question about this, as well as a question about Heathrow. In response, Johnson focused on Heathrow before responding with a simple “yes” to the Arcuri question, after which the press conference ended. (See 5.35pm.) Johnson’s answer did not amount to a serious attempt to defend his conduct on this matter but, as the Mirror’s Pippa Crerar says, it may be the first time he has actually acknowledged the affair.
Asked by @paulwaugh whether he acted with "honesty and integrity" in his affair with Jennifer Arcuri, Boris Johnson simply says: "Yes".
— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) April 20, 2021
Which is - I think - the first time the PM has confirmed their relationship. https://t.co/jGBslnSYBx
That’s all from me for today. But our coronavirus coverage continues on our global live blog. It’s here.
Updated
Here is the text of Boris Johnson’s opening statement at the press conference.
Q: Will the new carbon emissions targets affect the plan to build a third runway at Heathrow?
Johnson says that is a matter for Heathrow. It is a private company. He says his views on this are well known. But the fact that he is opposed to the runway does not mean he is opposed to aviation. He says there all sorts of ways emissions can be reduced from aviation. He says humanity will need to fly.
Q: Do you agree with the Independent Office for Police Conduct who said you should have declared your relationship with Jennifer Arcuri? They said that could be a breach of Nolan principles. They include honesty and integrity. Do you think you acted with honest and integrity in your relationship with Arcuir, who said you conducted your affair with her in the marital home?
The two questions (both from HuffPost’s Paul Waugh) come together (I separate them out when writing them up for the sake of clarity) and Johnson devotes most of his time to answer the first question, about Heathrow.
At the end, he says his answer to the second question is yes.
And that’s it. The press conference is over.
Updated
Q: What are the plans for using the Janssen vaccine in the UK, in the light of the concerns expressed about it?
Johnson says the UK is confident in the security of its supply. He says the government is still confident of meeting its vaccine targets.
Kanani says the Janssen vacicne is not being used in the UK yet, and it has not been approved by the MHRA yet.
Q: What is your view of the German model giving supporters a controlling share of clubs?
Johnson says this is something for the Tracey Crouch to consider.
Q: Will Sun readers be able to go abroad on holiday this summer?
Johnson says he cannot say yet which countries will be on the green, amber or red lists for travel. The government will do this in early May, he says. To do so now would be “premature”.
Q: Your promised a legislative “bomb” to stop the European super league. What do you mean?
Johnson says he does not want to say any more now. First of all he wants to back the Football Association and the Premier League in trying to thwart this plan.
Johnson says it is not right for football club owners to turn clubs into international brands without any reference to the fans who have loved them all their lives.
Johnson says Covid-status certificates will not be needed from 17 May.
But he says they could be used to open up some of the services that were very hard to open up last year.
The government will announced more in due course “if indeed we find it useful”. It probably would be useful, he says.
- Johnson hints that any use of Covid-status certificates might be limited.
Johnson confirms government willing to change law to block European super league
Q: Can you really stop the European Super League?
Johnson says the government’s first step is to support the football authorities in their opposition to this. But how can it be right? He says fans do not support this. It would be a cartel, and go against the principle of fair competition. He says if necessary he will seek “a legislative solution”.
Updated
Q: Do you have two potential antivirals available? You want to roll out two by the autumn. That is very ambitious.
Johnson says there are some. He says some have names like “Aztec divinities”. He names one.
Kanani says NHS England welcomes this initiative. She says over 22,000 lives have already been saved by dexamethasone. So treatments are available, she says.
Q: Why did it take so long to put India on the red list? Tens of thousands of people have travelled between the two countries recently? And why did it take you so long to cancel your India trip?
Johnson says the decision was taken by the JBC, the Joint Biosecurity Centre. The Indian variant is still just a variant under investigation, not a variant of concern. The JBC was acting on a precautionary basis, he says.
But he says there were strict controls on people arriving from people in India anyway.
He says they are looking carefully to see if there is any sign the Indian variant can escape vaccines.
Q: Will you be able to take the tough decisions needed to meet your new, tougher climate change targets?
Johnson says since 1990 emissions have been cut by 42 or 44%, while the economy have grown by 73%. So there is no conflict between tackling climate change and creating jobs, he claims.
Q: Will the data on deaths be amended to show if people who died have had the vaccine?
Johnson says he does not know if that is feasible. He says he suspects the number of people dying after a vaccine is “very small”, if there are any.
Dr Nikita Kanani says the government has made real progress in increasing vaccine take-up amongst minority ethnic people.
Among people from a Pakistani background, take-up is four times higher than it was in February. And amongst people from a Bangledeshi background, take-up is five times higher.
Updated
UK in drive to develop drugs to take at home to ‘stop Covid in its tracks’
Here is my colleague Sarah Boseley’s story about the antivirals taskforce.
Johnson announces antivirals taskforce to help combat Covid
Johnson says he is today announcing a new antivirals taskforce.
He says this means, if you test positive at home, you might be able to take a pill to stop the virus in its tracks.
Or, if you live with someone who has the virus, you may be able to take a pill to protect you.
Here is an extract from the embargoed news release with more details of the initiative.
A new antivirals taskforce has been launched by the government to identify treatments for UK patients who have been exposed to Covid-19 to stop the infection spreading and speed up recovery time.
The taskforce will search for the most promising novel antiviral medicines that can be taken at home and support their development through clinical trials to ensure they can be rapidly rolled out to patients as early as the autumn.
The taskforce will also look at opportunities to onshore the manufacture of antiviral treatments.
The aim is to have at least two effective treatments this year, either in a tablet or capsule form, that the public can take at home following a positive Covid-19 test or exposure to someone with the virus ...
The antivirals could be used alone or in combination with one another in order to increase effectiveness and reduce the risk of further mutations.
The new taskforce will sit alongside the government’s existing therapeutics taskforce, which will continue its vital work to identify and supply treatments found to be effective in clinical trials, for all stages of a patient’s exposure and response to Covid-19.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, the UK has proven itself to be a world-leader in identifying and rolling out effective treatments for Covid-19 – including the world’s first treatment dexamethasone, which has since saved 22,000 lives in the UK so far and an estimated million worldwide.
Updated
Boris Johnson starts by saying the country is continuing to make progress against Covid.
He encourages parents to continue testing their children as they return to school.
One in five adults has now had a second dose of vaccine, he says.
He says the vaccine programme is saving lives. But we don’t yet know how strong our defences will be.
He says he sees nothing in the data to suggest that the government will not be able to stick to the dates in the roadmap for lifting restrictions.
But the experts expect a further wave of cases to follow, and so the government will be rolling out booster vaccines.
60% of those aged 45-49 have had a covid jab, Boris Johnson tells Downing St press conference
— Hugo Gye (@HugoGye) April 20, 2021
Updated
Boris Johnson holds press conference
Boris Johnson is about to hold a press conference. He will be appearing with the medical director of primary care for NHS England, Dr Nikita Kanani.
Quarter of people meant to be isolating at home after arriving in UK do not get checked for compliance, Home Office admits
Up to a quarter of people who are meant to isolate at home when entering the UK from abroad do not get contacted by the authorities, Priti Patel, the home secretary, has admitted.
She made the admission in a letter (pdf) to the Commons home affairs committee. The committee wanted to know the Home Office’s estimate for the number of people fully complying with at-home quarantine. In response, Patel said:
To date there has been a high level of compliance and the vast majority of people contacted have confirmed they will self-isolate for 10 days on arrival to the UK. Of the 75,807 people who were potentially eligible to be contacted by IAC [Isolation Assurance and Compliance - the service that checks on people who have to self-isolate when they enter the country] for the week ending 01 March, approximately 75% were successfully contacted and deemed to be compliant and no further action was taken forward.
However, a further 13% were not contactable for a number of reasons including because they fell into a sectoral exemption, were non-eligible for sampling, for example residents of Scotland or Wales, or were a small number of passengers who provided insufficient information on the PLF [passenger locator form].
For the remainder, where the IAC has concerns that the contact is not self-isolating or cannot be reached, they refer these cases of concern to the Border Force Criminal Justice Unit (CJU), who identify the relevant police force and undertake some limited quality assurance to ensure the police have sufficient information to undertake their compliance checks and where necessary enforcement.
Yvette Cooper, the Labour chair of the committee, described this as an “astonishing admission”. She said:
This letter raises real concerns about significant gaps in the way that border Covid measures are being implemented.
The letter is confirmation that a quarter of international arrivals who aren’t going into mandatory quarantine are not contactable when they go home to self-isolate. It is also an astonishing admission that in thousands of cases where home isolation rules are being broken, no further enforcement action is taking place. We already knew from the police that they took no further enforcement action if someone was not at home when the checks took place or didn’t live at the address they had given even though that would be a clear breach of the regulations. Now the Home Office has confirmed that the Border Force also take no follow up enforcement action in these cases either. And there appears to be no reason to believe that this will change when private contractors are doing the initial checks instead. Given that only 1% of international arrivals are going into quarantine hotels, a properly enforced home quarantine system is vital to prevent new variants from spreading, and will be integral to any traffic light system the government announces for the summer.
Updated
Peers defeat government on fire safety bill with vote to protect tenants and leaseholders from post-Grenfell safety costs
Peers have inflicted a further heavy defeat on the government in seeking to ensure that the cost of fire safety improvements post-Grenfell do not fall on leaseholders and tenants, PA Media reports.
The House of Lords backed by 322 votes to 236 a change to the fire safety bill that would prevent remedial costs for work, such as the removal of unsafe cladding from blocks of flats, being passed on to residents until a support scheme is in place.
Number of Covid patients in UK hospitals falls below 2,000 for first time in more than six months
The government has just updated its coronavirus dashboard. Here are the key figures.
- The UK has recorded 33 more coronavirus deaths. Week on week, deaths are down 23.7%. That represents a slight levelling off of the rate of decline, because yesterday the week-on-week reduction was 26.9%.
- The UK has recorded 2,524 new cases. Week on week, cases are down 10.2%. Yesterday the week-on-week reduction was 10%.
- The number of patients in hospital in the UK with coronavirus has now fallen below 2,000 for the first time in more than six months. There were 1,973 patients in hospital on Sunday, the last day for which a figure is available on the dashboard. The figure has not been this low since 24 September, when 1,846 Covid patients were in hospital. At the peak in mid-January there were almost 40,000 Covid patients in hospitals.
- 99,672 people in the UK received their first dose of a vaccine yesterday, and 273,751 received their second dose. This means 62% of adults have had a first dose, and 19% of adults a second dose.
Updated
Border officials spot around 100 fake Covid certificates every day, MPs told
Around 100 people try to enter the country every day with a fake Covid-negative test certificate, MPs have been told. The figure came from Lucy Moreton from the Immigration Services Union (ISU) who told the all-party parliamentary group on coronavirus that officials did not know how many more fake certificates were being missed.
As PA Media reports, Moreton said about 20,000 people were coming into the country each day, most of whom are hauliers. To enter England people must provide proof of a negative test taken in the three days before departure - which can be shown to border agents as a printed document or through an email or text message.
Asked how border agents were able to verify proof of a negative test, Moreton told MPs:
We’re not is the simple answer, it’s predominately taken on trust. We do get 100 or more a day of fake Covid certificates, that we catch.
Updated
Boris Johnson posted this on Twitter earlier about his meeting with the football authorities.
Earlier @OliverDowden and I met with representatives from the @FA, @PremierLeague and football fan groups to discuss action against the proposed European Super League.
— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) April 20, 2021
No action is off the table and we are exploring every possibility to ensure these proposals are stopped. pic.twitter.com/QZMGRnXDcF
Here is our most recent story about Johnson’s plans to block the European super league proposal.
A total of 36,447,797 Covid-19 vaccinations took place in England between 8 December and 19 April, according to NHS England data, including first and second doses, which is a rise of 300,720 on the previous day.
As PA Media report, NHS England said 27,713,634 were the first dose of a vaccine, a rise of 85,055 on the previous day, while 8,734,163 were a second dose, an increase of 215,665.
In a written statement to MPs, Grant Shapps, the transport secretary, has said that no new smart motorways without a hard shoulder will open unless radar technology to detect stopped vehicles is installed. He also said that retrofitting the stopped vehicle detection system to the existing network will be completed by September 2022, six months earlier than planned.
Downing Street has now formally confirmed that it is setting a new target to cut carbon emissions by 78% by 2035, as reported overnight. The details are in a press release here.
Defence committee chair calls for Chilcot-style inquiry into Afghanistan
Tobias Ellwood, the chair of the defence committee, led calls for a “Chilcot-style” public inquiry into Britain’s 20-year military intervention in Afghanistan as he argued that last week’s US-led withdrawal announcement “cannot be the exit strategy that we envisaged”.
Speaking in the Commons earlier after tabling an urgent question, the senior Conservative said that the UK and other members of the Nato coalition that first invaded the country to dislodge the Taliban in 2001 had made a string of mistakes in the years since, contributing to a failure to fully stabilise the country in the run up to the withdrawal of 10,000 troops now planned before September 11. He said:
Our nation and our military deserve answers. So I request a Chilcot-style inquiry, so we can learn the lessons of what went wrong.
Ellwood’s proposal won the backing of the SNP’s Stuart McDonald but was not echoed by Labour.
The MP cited what he said were a string of errors made by the UK and US governments of the time. He said:
How did we squander the relative peace of the first four years? Why were the Taliban excluded from the peace talks in 2001, a fundamental error that could have brought stability?
Why were we too slow and building up Afghan security forces, a paltry 26,000, five years after the invasion? And why was Pakistan allowed to harbour and train the Taliban for so long?
And more widely, did the ease of the initial Afghan invasion, lead to an overconfidence by the US for them to then invade Iraq, meaning that we had to fight on two fronts?
Responding, James Heappey, the armed forces minister, said he didn’t “entirely share” Ellwood’s analysis”. The minister said that the security situation in the country was “relatively, by Afghan standards, benign” - and was the consequence of the “accommodation the US and the Taliban had come to last year”.
On the need for a public inquiry, Heappey said “it’s not for me to agree to such an inquiry right now” but added “one would hope that the lessons would be learned”. Later, he added it would be a decision for the prime minister and other senior ministers.
Updated
This is from ITV’s political editor, Robert Peston, on Johnny Mercer.
As I understand it, @JohnnyMercerUK is resigning because he feels he has failed - in that he wanted to prevent the trials of soldiers accused of killing an IRA official, and the trials start next week. Not many ministers these days admit failure, take responsibility and quit
— Robert Peston (@Peston) April 20, 2021
Key differences in the immune responses to Covid-19 are one of the reasons why some people get sick while others fight off infection without knowing they have it, according to scientists, PA Media reports. PA says:
UK researchers have found those who remain asymptomatic after catching coronavirus often have raised levels of a protective type of immune cell known as B cells, which is missing in people with severe symptoms.
The team also discovered that patients with mild to moderate symptoms have high levels of helper T-cells, which help fight infection, while those with serious symptoms have lost many of these immune cells.
They said the findings, published in the journal Nature Medicine, may in future help identify those who are more likely to develop severe disease by looking at levels of these immune cells in their blood and identifying potential treatments for them.
Prof Muzlifah Haniffa, senior author from Newcastle University and senior clinical fellow at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, said:
This is one of the only studies of its kind that looks at samples collected from asymptomatic people, which helps us start to understand why some people react differently to Covid-19 infection.
It could also explain symptoms such as lung inflammation and blood clots.
The immune system is made up of lots of different groups of cells, similar to the way an orchestra is made up of different groups of instruments, and in order to understand the coordinated immune response, you have to look at these immune cells together.
Updated
Dr David Nabarro, a special envoy on Covid for the World Health Organization, has said that it’s a matter of when, not if, a coronavirus variant emerges that is resistant to vaccines. As the Evening Standard reports, Nabarro told Sky News:
I want to be clear with you that I personally expect that variants will appear in different parts of the world that are capable of beating the protection offered by the vaccines.
It’s not the case of if, but when. So I’m saying to everybody that I work with, we do have to maintain our respect for this virus. We can beat it, but it means maintaining the physical distance and wearing masks, and also being really good about isolating.
Updated
Equalities minister claims Labour wants to create 'divisive atmosphere' around race
In response to Kemi Badenoch, Marsha de Cordova, her Labour shadow, strongly condemned the report. She said that it was “incoherent”, that it downplayed the importance of institutional and structural racism and that it effectively blamed ethnic minorities for their own disadvantages.
She said it had been widely discredited, and that its conclusions were “ideologically motivated”. She was surprised to hear Badenoch defending it, she said. The minister was defending the indefensible, she claimed.
She said commissioners have said that No 10 rewrote parts of the report.
In response, Badenoch said that Labour wanted to create a “divisive atmosphere” around race. She criticised De Cordova for not condemning the racist abuse levelled at the commissioners, and she said that Labour was “functionally innumerate” because it refused to accept the statistics in the report.
UPDATE: Badenoch said:
[De Cordova] is clearly determined to create a divisive atmosphere around race in this house, and in this country, and we will not stand for it.
We continue to push for a fairer Britain, for levelling up, they continue to look for division, they continue to stoke culture wars, and then claim that we are the ones fighting them.
I completely reject all of the assertions that she has made, many of them false, many of them hypocritical. Who’s party is it that has been determined institutionally racist by the Equality and Human Rights Commission? It’s not my party, it’s hers.
Updated
Minister says authors of race commission report received death threats following 'wilful misrepresentation' of what they said
In the Commons Kemi Badenoch, the equalities minister, is making a statement about the report from the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities.
She says the report paints a complex picture, compared to the way that race issues are often portrayed.
She says the report is clear that racism and discrimination are a factor affecting people’s lives.
Let me be clear, the report does not deny that institutional racism exists in the UK, rather the report did not find conclusive evidence of it in the specific areas it examined. It reaffirms the Macpherson report’s definition of the term but argues it should be applied more carefully and always based on evidence.
But it also says that different minority groups have different outcomes in some areas, and that racism is not always the explanation for this.
She says the commissioners have suffered “appalling abuse”.
The commissioners followed the evidence and challenged orthodoxy. They were prepared for a robust debate, she says.
The commissioners have followed the evidence and drawn conclusions which challenge orthodoxy, and they were prepared for robust and constructive debate.
However, they were not prepared for the wilful misrepresentation of the report which occurred following its publication, such as false accusations that they deny racism exists, or that they wish to put a positive spin on the atrocities of slavery, or false statements that commissioners did not read or sign-off on their own report, or that they are breaking ranks.
She says the commissioners stand by their report.
She says the government firmly condemns the “deeply personal and racialised” attacks that the commissioners have been subject to. They have faced death threats, she says. And she says one opposition MP even depicted them as members of the Ku Klux Klan. That was exactly the sort of racial hatred and abuse the report itself condemned, she says.
The government even more firmly condemns the deeply personal and racialised attacks against the commissioners which have included death threats, and in fact one member from the opposition benches presented commissioners as members of the Ku Klux Klan.
An example of the very online racial hatred and abuse on which the report itself recommended more action be taken by government.
It is wrong to accuse those who argue for a different approach as being racism deniers or race traitors. It is even more irresponsible - dangerously so - to call ethnic minority people racial slurs like Uncle Toms, coconuts, house slaves or house negroes for daring to think differently.
The Ku Klux Klan comment refers to a tweet from Labour’s Clive Lewis.
Badenoch says the commissioner were subject to “deplorable” racial slurs. These tactics are intended to stop minority ethnic people expressing their views, she says.
She says the government is setting up a ministerial committee to consider the recommendations reviews.
Updated
Post-Brexit traffic measures for trucks arriving in Kent removed as hauliers get used to new paperwork requirements
The government has announced it is dropping the Kent access permit, dubbed the Brexit passport, for lorry drivers passing through the county on their way to the continent by ferry or train.
The department for transport said lorry drivers are showing a “consistently high” degree of compliance with paperwork and there is no longer any need for the permit or the barriers down the M20 which will be removed on 24 April.
It said the average compliance with the requirement to have completed EU Brexit border checks paperwork before entering Kent is now 85%.
The decision to drop KAP was taken after ONS figures showed a 46% increase in exports from January 2021 to February.
Updated
Summary of Downing Street lobby briefing
Here are the main points from the Downing Street lobby briefing.
- No 10 confirmed that the government will toughen its greenhouse emission targets. “We want to continue to raise the bar on tackling climate change, and that’s why we’re setting the most ambitious target to cut emissions in the world,” the PM’s spokesman said.
- The spokesman suggested the UK government may liaise with its Spanish and Italian counterparts in its efforts to stop the European super league going ahead as planned. Asked if there would be talks with Spanish or Italian ministers on this, the spokesman said: “We are keen to speak to everyone involved in this, from other countries to the Premier League and others.”
- The spokesman said that Boris Johnson does not support a particular football team. And he could not say when Johnson last attended a game. He pointed out that Johnson himself acknowledged in his Sun article (see 9.47am) that he was not a football expert. The spokesman went on:
It is important to make the point you don’t need to be a dyed-in-the-wool football fan to recognise the importance of this issue, this is about the importance of football to the local communities and to the fans and to ensuring their is proper competition.
- The spokesman played down the prospects of the UK triggering article 16 to allow it to suspend parts of the Northern Ireland protocol. (See 10.35am.) Asked if there were any plans to activate article 16, the spokesman said: “No”. He went on:
While there are no plans currently, [triggering article 16] is an option under the protocol and we don’t rule it out categorically. But our focus in the short term is on making sure the EU and the parties in Northern Ireland help address the outstanding problems of the protocol.
- The spokesman confirmed that Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, and Prof Jonathan Van-Tam, England’s deputy chief medical officer, are in Israel looking at how its vaccine passport scheme works.
Updated
Corbyn loses appeal against preliminary findings in libel case
Jeremy Corbyn has lost an appeal against a high court judge’s findings in the preliminary stages of a libel claim brought against the former Labour leader by a political blogger, PA Media reports. PA says:
Commentator Richard Millett is suing Corbyn over remarks he made during an interview on the BBC’s Andrew Marr show in 2018, when he was leader of the opposition.
Corbyn says he was defending himself against allegations of antisemitism when he made the comments and is contesting the case.
During the broadcast, Corbyn was asked if he was an antisemite and shown a recording of a speech he made in 2013 in which he referred to “Zionists” who “don’t understand English irony”.
In response, Corbyn referred to two people having been “incredibly disruptive” and “very abusive” at a meeting in the House of Commons the same year, at which Manuel Hassassian - then Palestinian ambassador to the UK - was speaking.
Millett’s legal action is brought on the basis that, although he was not named by Corbyn, he was defamed because national media coverage before the broadcast made him identifiable to viewers as one of those referred to.
Giving judgment on a number of preliminary issues in the case in July last year, Mr Justice Saini made a decision on the “natural and ordinary meaning” of the words complained of by Millett and found that they referred to him.
The judge found the meaning of the words included that Millett had been “so disruptive” that police wished to remove him from the premises, that he had acted in a disruptive way at other meetings and that Hassassian was “caused distress” by his behaviour.
He also concluded the remarks were a “statement of fact”, rather than opinion, and were defamatory of Millett at common law.
Corbyn challenged some of the judge’s findings at a court of appeal hearing in March.
His lawyers argued the judge was wrong to find his statement was “entirely factual” and said it was the “exercise of the right to freedom of expression by a senior politician in the context of a discussion about a highly charged and sensitive political issue”.
They also argued the statement was not defamatory at common law.
But Corbyn’s appeal was dismissed by three senior judges in a ruling this morning.
Lord Justice Warby, who heard the appeal with Sir Geoffrey Vos and Dame Victoria Sharp, said that having watched the whole interview he agreed with Mr Justice Saini.
He said: “Mr Corbyn was giving his explanation as to why he had said that the Zionists in the 2013 meeting did not understand English irony.
“To do so, he was explaining, from his standpoint, what had happened. He was telling the story. In doing so, he provided factual background and context.
“In the particular words complained of he was, in my judgment, presenting viewers with a factual narrative: the people referred to had disrupted several meetings at the House of Commons; at one such meeting they had been extremely disruptive; and on the most recent occasion, whilst they had let Mr Hassassian speak, they had subjected him to extreme abuse afterwards.
“This would all have struck the viewer as Mr Corbyn’s explanation of the factual background to his statement about ‘English irony’.”
Lord Justice Warby also agreed with the judge’s conclusion that the statement was defamatory at common law.
He said: “Alleging disruptive behaviour that leads the police to want to remove a person from a public meeting, and alleging such verbal abuse of a public speaker that the leader of the opposition was forced to speak up in controversial terms to defend him, crosses the common law threshold of seriousness.
“The judge was right to hold that such allegations would tend to have a substantial adverse effect on the attitude that people would take to Mr Millett.”
Unless a settlement is reached between Corbyn and Millett, the case will now proceed to a full libel trial.
Photograph: Matt Dunham/AP
Updated
Downing Street was unable to shed any more light on whether Johnny Mercer is or is not quitting as a defence minister at today’s lobby briefing. The prime minister’s spokesman said that Mercer was “a valued minister in the government” and that he was not aware of Mercer having had a conversation with Boris Johnson today about resigning, or of any plans for the two to speak.
Updated
Sturgeon confirms further lockdown easing for Scotland from Monday
Nicola Sturgeon has confirmed that mainland Scotland will move down to level 3 of the Scottish government’s Covid controls from next Monday (26 April) in the biggest raft of changes to restrictions since lockdown was re-imposed on Boxing Day last year.
The latest easing will see the reopening of hospitality, gyms and non-essential shops, as well as allowing non-essential travel between Scotland, England and Wales for the first time this year.
Sturgeon said she was “very hopeful of seeing sustained progress” into the summer, with people able to meet together indoors in their own homes in limited numbers from 17 May.
The unlocking at level 3 also includes:
- Up to six people from two households can socialise indoors in a public place such as a café or restaurant, which can open until 10pm, but alcohol can only be served outdoors.
- Tourist accommodation can reopen, with self-catering accommodation still restricted in line with rules on indoor mixing.
- Gyms and swimming pools can reopen for individual exercise.
- Galleries, museums and libraries can open.
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Johnny Mercer reportedly 'on brink of resignation' as defence minister
Johnny Mercer, the defence minister, is “on the brink of resigning from government over its failure to prevent ex-soldiers being dragged through the courts for alleged crimes committed in Northern Ireland”, according to a Telegraph report by Robert Mendick. Mendick says Mercer has told the PM he wants to go, but that he does not plan to announce his resignation until parliament has passed the overseas operations bill, which is intended to protect veterans from what are deemed vexatious prosecutions in relation to past conflicts like Iraq, has become law. The bill has gone through the Commons and the Lords, but tomorrow it will be debated again by MPs as they consider Lords amendments to it. (See 12.04pm.)
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Johnson restates determination to 'take whatever action necessary' to block 'closed shop' European super league plan
Downing Street has just released its readout from the meeting that Boris Johnson held this morning with the Football Association, the Premier League and representatives from some supporters’ groups. It says:
The prime minister and culture secretary Oliver Dowden met with representatives from the Football Association, the Premier League and football fan groups this morning to discuss action against the proposed European super league.
He expressed his solidarity with football fans and agreed they must always be at the heart of any decisions about the future of the game.
He reiterated his unwavering support for the football authorities and confirmed they have the government’s full backing to take whatever action necessary to put a stop to these plans.
All attendees agreed that action was necessary to protect the fairness and open competition we expect to see in football, and to uphold the fundamental principle that any club should have the chance to play and win against the biggest players in the game.
The prime minister confirmed the government will not stand by while a small handful of owners create a closed shop.
He was clear that no action is off the table and the government is exploring every possibility, including legislative options, to ensure these proposals are stopped.
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In Scotland Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister, has just started her coronavirus briefing.
As usual, she started with the latest Covid figures.
NS: "Before I talk about those changes in more detail, I will start with today’s Covid statistics.
— The SNP (@theSNP) April 20, 2021
The total number of positive cases reported yesterday was 178 - 1.4% of the total number of tests."
NS: "106 people are currently in hospital, which is 2 more than yesterday.
— The SNP (@theSNP) April 20, 2021
13 people are in intensive care, which is a reduction of 1 from yesterday."
NS: "Unfortunately 2 deaths were reported yesterday of patients who first tested positive over the previous 28 days.
— The SNP (@theSNP) April 20, 2021
That takes the total number of deaths, under that daily definition to 7,644.
Again, I want to send my condolences to all those who have lost a loved one."
And these are from the Telegraph’s Lucy Fisher on the Johnny Mercer reports.
NEW - Govt is preparing to table its own amendment exempting torture, war crimes & genocide from protections in Overseas Ops Bill, sources claim
— Lucy Fisher (@LOS_Fisher) April 20, 2021
Big win for ex-Nato chief Lord (George) Robertson if so, following his defeat of Govt in Lords last week
Linked to Mercer reports?👇 https://t.co/1HtD3Igb98
Alternatively, could it be Govt proposals on dealing with veterans of Norther Ireland Troubles (who are facing repeated probes) that have caused Johnny Mercer upset?
— Lucy Fisher (@LOS_Fisher) April 20, 2021
This is from Larisa Brown, the Times’s defence editor, on Johnny Mercer.
Mercer has been furious with the slow pace of the bill to protect Northern Ireland veterans for months. Earlier comments - https://t.co/p5ILACAcnj https://t.co/70OcFZgTIi
— Larisa Brown (@larisamlbrown) April 20, 2021
According to Sky’s Sam Coates, Johnny Mercer is considering resigning as a defence minister. Mercer is minister for veterans, and on Sky Coates has said that Mercer is believed to be unhappy in his post because of the lack of progress being made with legislation supposed to protect veterans from prosecution in relation to historic cases.
Defence minister Johnny Mercer likely to (try to) resign shortly I understand. He is understood to have indicated such to colleagues.
— Sam Coates Sky (@SamCoatesSky) April 20, 2021
BUT he is not thought to have seen the PM yet to tell him. So watch this space
Covid deaths in England and Wales now equivalent to flu and pneumonia deaths, ONS says
The number of people dying as a direct result of Covid in England and Wales in the first week of April was on a par with flu and pneumonia for the first time in six months.
Figures released by the ONS this morning show that 280 people died as a direct result of Covid in the week to 9 April. Coronavirus was a contributory factor in a further 99 deaths the same week.
This compares to 278 deaths as a direct result of either flu or pneumonia. A further 1,018 people died with influenza or pneumonia as a contributory factor.
The average number of Covid deaths occurring across the UK has fallen to below 50 per day, a figure last seen in early October.
The ONS figures show that UK-wide there were 646 Covid deaths in the 14 days to 9 April, an average of 46 deaths occurring per day.
It brings to almost 152,000 the number of people who have died either directly as a result of coronavirus or where Covid contributed to their death as mentioned on the death certificate.
This differs from the government’s official figure of 127,274 which counts people who are known to have died within 28 days of a positive Covid-19 test.
The data showed the number of deaths from all causes in care homes and hospitals were below average in the week to 9 April. Excess deaths in private homes - a metric which counts deaths above the five-year average for that week - were 18% higher than usual, and increased from the previous week. However, the figures may be affected by the Good Friday and Easter Monday Bank Holidays falling in different weeks than in previous years.
The Commons Treasury committee has this morning published five letters it is sending to individuals or organisations it wants to question as part of its inquiry into the collapse of Greensill Capital. They include David Cameron, the former prime minister, and Rishi Sunak, the chancellor. Copies of all five letters are on the committee’s website here.
The questions for Cameron, set out in this letter (pdf), are primarily about exactly what lobbying he did on behalf of Greensill, and when he learnt the company was in trouble.
Labour’s candidate for the upcoming Hartlepool byelection, Paul Williams, is under fire, following reporting by the Northern Echo that shows he commissioned a report that supported the removal of critical care services from Hartlepool hospital. Williams, a GP, has said bringing services back to the hospital is a top priority.
The report published in September 2013, which was implemented in full, stated that bringing some services together “would mean that patients with lots of medical problems will not be able to have planned operations like hip replacements at the University Hospital of Hartlepool but we do not expect this would affect very many patients because modern anaesthetics are safer”.
Williams visited the town earlier this month with the shadow health secretary, Jonathan Ashworth, who pointed out that many of the towns 100,000 residents were “sat waiting for hip replacements and knee replacements”, pledging to restore and rebuild services.
Tory party co-chair Amanda Milling has labelled Williams a “hospital hypocrite”. She said:
He was responsible for a report that recommended moving services out of the University Hospital of Hartlepool – and they were. These were services best delivered locally and which local people desperately wanted to stay in their local hospital.
He then has the nerve to bring Labour frontbenchers up to Hartlepool complaining about a lack of hip replacements, when he was responsible for stopping them in the first place.
Williams has said that the hospital was an “impossible position” following years of Tory NHS budget cuts and that in 2013 he was a doctor “doing the only safe thing possible”. He also said the Tories were ignoring the fact that he subsequently fought to bring services back to Hartlepool hospital. He said:
The Tories closed the A&E back in 2011, Hartlepool was left overnight without any doctor and we worked together with the hospital to open the urgent care centre in 2017 we’re now really proud of. I did the first shifts there and I’m continuing to do shifts there during this election campaign.
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Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, was giving interviews morning about a consultation his department is launching on flexible apprenticeships (which would allow apprentices to learn different skills with different employers). But he was also asked about the lobbying controversy, and in particular whether any civil servants in his department have been combining their government jobs with private sector work. Last week No 10 ordered a swift review to find out how widely this has been happening.
Williamson replied:
We’ve done all that work and we’ve established that and we’ve shared that with (the) Cabinet Office. There were some people that had worked on charitable bodies but, other than that, nothing else.
Johnson says he expects no vote on Irish reunification for 'very, very long time to come'
Next month marks the 100th anniversary of Northern Ireland as a political unit. It was set up as a result of the 1920 Government of Ireland Act, which was also intended to deliver home rule for southern Ireland. As Ivan Gibbons explains in a good new book about the split, Partition: How and Why Ireland was Divided, home rule survived in the north, even though that was the one place that did not want it. In the south the Government of Ireland Act was quickly made redundant by the war leading to independence.
Tonight BBC Northern Ireland is showing a Spotlight documentary to mark the centenary and it features an interview with Boris Johnson. In it, he made two contentious claims.
- Johnson described some of the aspects of the Northern Ireland protocol, which governs post-Brexit trading arrangements between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, as “absurd”. And he restated his threat to invoke article 16 - which would allow parts of the protocol to be suspended - if the EU did not agree to make changes. He said:
If we can’t make enough progress and if it looks as though the EU is going to be very, very dogmatic about it and we continue to have absurd situations so you can’t bring in rose bushes with British soil into Northern Ireland, you can’t bring British sausages into Northern Ireland, then frankly I’m going to, we’ll have to take further steps.
What we’re doing is removing what I think of as the unnecessary protuberances and barriers that have grown up and we’re getting the barnacles off the thing and sandpapering it into shape.
The “barnacles off the boat” image is one that was, of course, popularised by Lynton Crosby, the Tory election strategist, who reportedly used it to describe his strategy of getting a party to offload unpopular policies ahead of an election. But given that the UK government negotiated the protocol with the EU, in this case Johnson is talking about removing barnacles that he effectively put there in the first place. This is a point that has been made by Neale Richmond, a member of the Irish parliament and a Fine Gael European affairs spokesman.
Worth remembering that what Boris Johnson calls ludicrous is what he himself negotiated & ratified, the post #Brexit protocol isn’t a foreign construct https://t.co/p8DZRUv0Bh
— Neale Richmond (@nealerichmond) April 20, 2021
Stephen Farry, the Alliance MP, has also accused the PM of making “false promises”.
More false promises only make things worse. @BorisJohnson must be open and honest re why Protocol exists and realistic options available.
— Stephen Farry MP (@StephenFarryMP) April 20, 2021
Short of rejoining SM & CU, in order to fix Protocol, UK needs to more closely align with a Veterinary Agreement.https://t.co/O92Bpwa91C
- Johnson said he thought there would not be a referendum on the reunification of Ireland for “a very, very long time to come”. In response Gerry Adams, the former Sinn Féin president, has dismissed this as “yarn” - which roughly translated as bullshit, I’m told.
Boris Johnson: No Border poll for ‘very long time to come’ SUCH YARN!!! https://t.co/kWIiCYD5um
— Gerry Adams (@GerryAdamsSF) April 20, 2021
My colleague Lisa O’Carroll has written up Johnson’s interview in full here.
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Scottish Tory plans to raise NHS spending to reach an extra £2bn a year, and to cut property sales taxes, in the next Holyrood parliament have been welcomed by the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
In a briefing the IFS said the Tory proposals, which would add nearly £5bn to NHS funding over the five-year lifetime of the next Scottish parliament, closely matched those in the Scottish National party’s manifesto last week.
The institute applauded Tory plans to raise the threshold of land and buildings transaction tax (LBTT), Scotland’s version of stamp duty, to £250,000 and cut rates on higher value properties. The IFS said LBTT was “a particularly damaging tax” but it was unhappy the Tories have failed to discuss revaluing council tax rates, which “ridiculously” have not changed since 1990.
Ben Zaranko, an IFS analyst, said Tory proposals to eventually cut higher Scottish income tax rates to equal those in England would cost around £400m, and that would mean spending cuts elsewhere. He said:
The Scottish Conservatives’ manifesto reflects the seeming consensus in Scottish politics on a range of issues - increases to carer’s allowance, doubling the Scottish child payment, universal free school meals for primary school aged children, and more generous childcare, to name a few.
The Conservatives’ NHS spending pledge of £2bn extra by 2025-26 is at least as generous as the SNP’s, despite the headline figure they cite being lower than that cited by the SNP. Importantly, though, an extra £2bn would not be sufficient to deliver on the Conservatives’ promise of a ‘double lock’ for the Scottish NHS.
UK unemployment rate falls to 4.9% despite Covid restrictions
UK unemployment edged down in February as the jobs market showed further signs of improvement before the easing of Covid restrictions, my colleague Richard Partington reports.
Boris Johnson has used an article in the Sun this morning to restate his opposition to the plans for a European super league. To his credit, unlike some of his predecessors, he does not feign an interest in the sport that he does not really have (he starts by saying he is “far from an expert”), but he does show that he understands why fans hate the ESL concept so much. He says:
You only need a pulse to know that football is not a brand or a product. In fact it’s so much more than even a sport.
Football clubs in every town and city and at every tier of the pyramid have a unique place at the heart of their communities, and are an unrivalled source of passionate local pride.
And the joy of the game’s current structure, one that has kept people coming back year after year, generation after generation, is that even the most seemingly endless period of frustration is made bearable by the possibility, however remote, that one day you could see them rise up.
After all if Leicester City can win the Premier League, if Nottingham Forest can be champions of Europe not once but twice then maybe, just maybe, your team can do the same.
But that can only happen if the playing field is even vaguely level and the ability to progress is universal.
The European Super League guarantees neither, which is why it has been roundly rejected by the people who matter most: the fans.
There will be some reference to this story here today, because it has become a major political issue, but for full (and much better) coverage, do read our separate European super league live blog. It’s here.
Ministers created confusion by muddling lockdown guidance with law, police watchdog says
Good morning. If you found the endless changes to coronavirus regulations that we’ve had over the last year hard to follow, you were in good company. Today Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services, which regulates the police, has published a report on policing in the pandemic (pdf) and it says police officers also found it hard to keep up with what was allowed and what was not.
Here are the main points.
- Forces expressed “frequent frustration” about the lack of notice they had about rule changes, the report says. It says:
Many forces expressed frequent frustration at the lack of notice they were given about some changes in the law and guidance. Some senior officers told us they were unable to provide timely and clear operational guidance to frontline officers ...
The first set of regulations was made on 26 March 2020 and came into effect even before they were laid before parliament. In the months which followed, the regulations were amended and supplemented a considerable number of times, when lockdown restrictions were eased or strengthened, imposed, relaxed and re-imposed, in different parts of the country, for different periods and with differing intensities. The first set of regulations covered 11 pages; the last set extended to 123 pages. It was hard to keep up with them.
- Ministers added to the confusion by not differentiating between guidance and law, the report says. It says this led to officers making mistakes which undermined confidence in the police. It says:
[Police officers’] difficulty was made worse by a widespread confusion in relation to the status of government announcements and statements by ministers. Ministers asserting that their guidance – which had no higher status than requests – were in fact “instructions to the British people” inevitably confused people. In some cases, police officers misunderstood the distinction, and appeared to believe that ministerial instructions were equivalent to the criminal law.
For example, the 2-metre distancing ‘rule’ has only ever been in guidance (aside from some requirements on the hospitality sector such as licensed premises and restaurants). The request to ‘stay local’ has never been a legal requirement. The suggested limits on the number of times a person could go out to exercise in a day and for how long were only ever in guidance, not regulations ...
It is not the function of the police to treat government guidance, however well-intentioned (as it undoubtedly was), as rules of the criminal law. Ministers may create criminal offences only if authorised by parliament to do so; they may not do so by the simple expedient of demanding action from a podium or behind a lectern.
And as difficulties arose and some well-publicised mistakes were made, public confidence in, and support for, the police were inevitably put at risk.
- But it says overall much police work during the lockdown was “measured, proportionate and sound”. It says:
Despite these extraordinary difficulties and pressures, a very significant proportion of police work to deal with the lockdown was measured, proportionate and sound.
There is more on the report here.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: Boris Johnson chairs cabinet.
10am: The court of appeal delivers its judgment in Jeremy Corbyn’s appeal against a preliminary ruling that remarks he made about a pro-Israel activist were defamatory.
12pm: Downing Street is due to hold its daily lobby briefing.
12pm: Election experts Prof Jane Green and Prof Michael Thrasher speak at a UK in a Changing Europe briefing on the May elections.
12.15pm: Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, is expected to hold a coronavirus briefing.
After 1.15pm: Kemi Badenoch, the equalities minister, makes a Commons statement on the much-criticised report from the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities.
2.30pm: Sir Jonathan Jones QC, the former head of the government’s legal department, gives evidence to the Commons justice committee on how Covid laws have worked.
5pm: Boris Johnson is expected to hold a press conference at No 10.
Johnson is also holding talks today with the football authorities and fans’ representatives about the plans for a European super league.
Covid is the issue dominating UK politics this year and Politics Live is often largely or wholly devoted to coronavirus at the moment. But I will be covering non-Covid politics too and - depending on what seems most important and most interesting to readers - sometimes these stories will take precedence.
For global coronavirus news, do read our global live blog.
I try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter. I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
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