That’s it from the UK politics blog team, thanks for following our coverage.
You can follow our ongoing global coronavirus blog here -
So to conclude, MPs have this evening approved the extension of coronavirus restrictions in England until 19 July.
The prime minister was spared a defeat as Labour backed plans for a four-week delay to the end of lockdown measures, aimed at buying more time for the vaccine programme.
MPs voted 461 to 60, a majority of 401, to approve regulations delaying the easing of the measures.
For now, limits on numbers for sports events, theatres and cinemas will remain in place, nightclubs will stay shuttered and people will be asked to continue working from home where possible.
It comes after furious Tories rounded on Johnson, Matt Hancock and the government’s scientific advisers over the extension of Covid restrictions in England, PA reports.
They cast doubt on the prime minister’s commitment that 10 July would be a “terminus” date for the lockdown after he was forced to postpone easing restrictions on 21 June.
Updated
MPs vote to extend Covid-related proceedings in Commons until 22 July
MPs have voted 588 to 25, majority 563, to extend virtual participation and other pandemic-related measures connected to proceedings in the House of Commons until 22 July.
That date is the start of the summer recess.
Updated
60 MPs vote against four-week extension to lockdown until July 19
— John Stevens (@johnestevens) June 16, 2021
In March, when the Commons last voted on restrictions, there were 76 votes against
MPs are now voting on the renewal of the rules for parliament sittings during the pandemic.
The government has announced that the lifting of restrictions in England will be delayed by four weeks with a review in two weeks.
The division result is expected at 7:20pm.
Updated
MPs vote to approve extending social restrictions in England to 19 July
Ayes: 461.
Nos: 60. Majority of 401.
Updated
Vote on Covid-19 restrictions begins
MPs are now voting on the renewal of Covid-19 restrictions for England. The division result is expected at 7:10pm.
The Health Secretary now forever branded ‘hopeless Hancock’ by Boris Johnson.
— Jonathan Ashworth 😷💙 (@JonAshworth) June 16, 2021
With restrictions extended thanks to failures to protect borders, people across the country will share the Prime Minister’s sentiment. pic.twitter.com/B5uNBj771g
This afternoon I will vote against extending #COVID restrictions until 19 July. The sacrifices of the entire nation, old and young, alongside our world-leading vaccine dividend, should see our freedoms restored. pic.twitter.com/MH8FeNbAio
— Huw Merriman MP (@HuwMerriman) June 16, 2021
Sir Edward Leigh, Conservative MP for Gainsborough, cited Paddington Bear in his argument.
Sir Leigh said: “This is never going to end. At the end of this month, they’ll be another variant ... the Peruvian variant, Paddington Bear will be arrested at Paddington station ... and put in quarantine, it’ll go on and on and on.”
He added: “There’s been too much shifting of goal posts, too many fatuous rules based not on science, but on populism.
“Our society should be free and open, and there’s a real danger the public will increasingly ignore this. The government will be a government of the emperor without clothes.”
Updated
Huw Merriman, Conservative MP for Bexhill and Battle, said that young people “need to see a return” to normality.
He said: “I spoke to one of the very senior NHS leads who has university-aged children and he said to me - and I wrote it down - too many of us making decisions have forgotten what it feels like to be a 20-year-old or how miserable it is to be a 20-year-old right now.
“Those lives of young people that have made great sacrifices to help to the cohorts 1-9 that I talked about, they have made those sacrifices, they need to see a return, they need to see the return this summer.”
Updated
A source close to health secretary Matt Hancock said Dominic Cummings has still not backed up his “unsubstantiated suggestions”, PA reports.
“No evidence has been provided today to back up previous unsubstantiated suggestions,” the source said.
“The secretary of state addressed these issues at the select committee.
“He will continue to work closely with the prime minister to roll out the vaccine and get us out of this pandemic as quickly as possible.”
Updated
Chris Green, Conservative MP for Bolton West, talked about fears of further lockdown extensions beyond July 19.
Speaking in the Commons, he said: “When the prime minister refers to a terminus I fear he doesn’t mean the end, I fear he’s thinking more of a bus terminus where we end one journey to start another and there will be another vehicle to impose another lockdown extension.”
Updated
Liam Fox, a doctor and the former international trade secretary, in his speech said: “What we cannot have is the country being held to ransom by any groups who have been offered a vaccine but have chosen not to take - that is utterly unacceptable.”
Sir Robert Syms, Conservative MP for Poole, told MPs “we have won the battle” against Covid-19 after he highlighted hospital admission rates in his area.
Ahead of the Commons vote at 7pm, Sir Robert said of the delay: “My view is that most of the senior ministers who took this decision need a damn good holiday because if you look at the data, if you look at what’s happening in the country, the restrictions are totally out of kilter with the sense of the problem.
“Let me take the south-west of England, there’s 5.6 million people, there are 23 people in hospital, there are two in ICU. In Dorset where there’s nearly a million people, we have one person in hospital.
“Yet hundreds of couples that want to get married, businesses that want to be viable, people that want to get their lives back in order, I just think the balance is wrong.”
Updated
Earlier in the debate Sir Charles Walker said members of Sage should have to declare their business interests. (See 4.21pm.) A reader has been in touch to say they already do. The list is here (pdf).
That’s all from me for today.
My colleague Nadeem Badshah is now taking over.
Updated
Tory MPs speak out against delaying lifting of final lockdown restrictions in England
In the Commons Peter Bone (Con) is speaking now, and he says only five of the 51 MPs down to speak have been Labour backbenchers. Almost all the speakers we have had so far have been Tory MPs, and mostly the ones speaking have been those opposed to delaying the final lifting of lockdown restrictions, or willing to support the government with considerable reluctance. Those contributing have mostly been well-known lockdown sceptics (like Bone, who says he will vote against the government).
Here are extracts (from PA Media) from earlier speeches from Conservatives.
Dr Luke Evans said:
For over 800 years this house has been making decisions on risk, be it sending men and women to war, providing financial support, instigating reform in trades or even laws, and tonight’s vote boils down to an assessment of risk ..
During the next month I’d urge the government to bring forward a debate on the risk this house is prepared to accept regarding Covid, after all as I said at the start of this speech, the house has been deciding this for 800 years, why should it change now?
Steve Baker said:
We have transformed this society for the worse.
We have put in place a culture of habits which will take years to shake off, culture and habits which distance people from one another and diminish their quality of life, the quality of relationships that they have with one another.
Karen Bradley said:
With a heavy heart, I’m afraid to say to the minister that I cannot support the government this evening, because I cannot find a way to explain to my constituents why the things they are looking forward to getting back to doing have to wait.
We have to accept that we cannot save every life ... I might have been able to be persuaded if the government was able to support those businesses that are unable to open but that support is simply not there ... I will not be able to support the government, although I will on procedural matters [ie, the vote on extending the rules allowing virtual participation in Commons debates - two votes are due at 7pm, one on lockdown rules, and one on Commons procedure].
Dame Andrea Leadsom said:
I will with a very heart support the government, trusting that the government is determined as we’ve been assured by [Matt Hancock] that if possible those restrictions will be lifted after two weeks and not four weeks, I urge them to do that.
Updated
Northern Ireland could be recording more than 1,000 Covid-19 cases a day by the end of the summer, Department of Health modelling has suggested. PA Media reports:
The 1,000 to 1,200 daily case number at the end of August is the department’s central projection of the virus’ trajectory over the coming months.
That number of cases would translate to between 200 to 300 hospital inpatients with Covid-19 by mid-September.
The department’s modelling is based on three assumptions - the Delta variant becoming dominant in the region; 85% of the adult population having received two doses of vaccine and the public continuing to adhere to social distancing and hygiene guidance.
UK records 9,055 new cases, and nine further deaths, with weekly hospital admissions up 41%
The UK has recorded 9,055 new coronavirus cases, and nine further deaths, according to today’s update on the government’s dashboard. This is the highest daily figure for almost four months.
The figures also show the weekly total for hospital admissions up 41.4% on the total for the previous week - although this figure is a few days out of date because the figures for most recent week only go up to last Saturday.
Updated
Back in the Commons Liam Fox (Con), a doctor and the former international trade secretary, is speaking now. Echoing Charles Walker (see 4.21pm), he says he is “sick to death” of seeing government science advisers talking on TV. He says if they want to be stars of Sky News, they should leave Sage.
How convincing is Hunt's defence of Hancock against Cummings' allegations?
Jeremy Hunt, the Conservative chair of the Commons health committee, has posted a thread on Twitter about the inquiry his committee and the science committee conducted into the Covid pandemic. Dominic Cummings gave his evidence to the two committees, in which he accused Matt Hancock of lying, and Hancock gave his own evidence last week.
Normally committee chairs do not reveal the conclusions of their inquiries until they publish their reports. (And in the past MPs have been suspended from the Commons for leaking report conclusions in advance.) But Hunt has effectively preempted the publication of the report by summing up what he sees as some of its key conclusions.
Here is the first post of the thread.
Here’s an early take on our two bumper select committee grillings over the last two weeks - Dominic Cummings and Matt Hancock. A thread...
— Jeremy Hunt (@Jeremy_Hunt) June 16, 2021
One of the main purposes of the thread seems to be to defend Hancock in the light of the new claims made about him by Cummings this afternoon. Hunt says:
There was more melodrama than normal but it is not possible to stack up the most sensational revelations without evidence. Today's new @Dominic2306 tweets show the PM's total frustration ('f***ing useless' etc.) but do not prove anyone 'lied.'
— Jeremy Hunt (@Jeremy_Hunt) June 16, 2021
It is true that Cummings failed to provide the inquiry with a dossier of written evidence about Hancock ahead of Hancock’s appearance before the committee. And it is true that some of Cummings’ allegations were a lot more generalised, or more imprecise, than others. Very often disputes about “lies” hinge on interpretation.
But it is hard to read this tweet, or Hunt’s other comments on this topic, without concluding that Hunt and some of his colleagues have not tried particularly hard to assess rigorously the truth or otherwise of what Cummings said, and that Hancock has found his fate in the hands of a particularly friendly judge.
For example, Cummings said that Sir Mark Sedwill, the then cabinet secretary, told Boris Johnson in April last year he had lost confidence in Hancock’s evidence. If this were untrue, then Sedwill could be asked to deny it, but the committee does not appear to have made any effort to get his version of the story.
Hunt and some of his colleagues seem to be taking the view that testimony given by Cummings in person about what he heard does not actually count as evidence. One example was when Cummings said he had actually heard Johnson make the comment about being willing to see “bodies pile high” that Johnson, from the dispatch box in the Commons, denied making. There is no reason why Johnson’s version should be deemed credible, but not Cummings.
And Hunt is also disregarding some of the written evidence produced by Cummings today. For example, the new Cummings blog includes a quote from a text he received from Boris Johnson on 13 March saying: “How do we win the herd immunity argument?” Yet Hancock has repeatedly said herd immunity was never government policy. This text at least makes that open to challenge.
Updated
The latest edition of the Guardian’s Politics Weekly podcast is out. Jessica Elgot and Martin Kettle discuss the political fallout of the announced delay to the lifting of coronavirus restrictions in England. Plus: Peter Walker is joined by Sonia Sodha and Katy Balls to ask why MP’s are so keen to get involved in the perennial culture wars.
Tory MP Charles Walker says Sage members should be banned from giving media interviews
In the debate Sir Charles Walker, another arch Tory lockdown-sceptic, is up now, and he says we should know the annual incomes of people on Sage. We know what MPs are paid, he says.
And he says Sage members should also have to disclose significant shareholdings, and outside earnings.
He says this is because they are making huge decisions that affect millions of people.
(In fact, Sage influences decisions, but it does not take them. If it did, a second lockdown would have been ordered in September.)
Walker says Sage members should not be allowed to go on TV and say they are speaking “in a personal capacity”. And he says there should be elections for Sage members.
Steve Baker (Con) says Sage experts are cautious. He proposes a diversity of opinion, with “red team challenges”.
Walker says there is an Independent Sage, but he suggests that they are even more hardline than Sage.
He says that Sage members should either be allowed to advise the government, or to go on TV. But they should not be allowed to do both.
There is an alternative to elections, financial disclosure - and that is the prime minister could say to members of Sage ‘here it is, you can either advise me or you can advise the Today programme, Sky, Channel 4, but you can’t do both. You can either be a serious scientist at this moment time advising your government or you can be a media talking head, building a career outside Sage’.
I think that is a perfectly legitimate thing to do. We would not expect the generals to give a running commentary on a war, undermining politicians. It’s just not acceptable.
Can you imagine if the clerks of my committee who advise my committee were going out and briefing what they’d like to see my committee do, pushing us into a corner all the time?
It wouldn’t be tolerable, it wouldn’t be tolerated by this place and it shouldn’t be tolerated by Number 10.
Updated
Sir Desmond Swayne, one of the Conservative MPs most opposed to the lockdown, is speaking in the Commons debate now.
He says he never thought the government’s Covid restrictions were proportionate, even when we were in an emergency. But “by any measure” the emergency has passed, he says.
The government does not trust the people that it governs. Now many members of Sage - Sage there’s a misnomer if ever there was one - but members of Sage have been out busily undermining public morale, one of them even sharing her dystopian vision that we must all remain masked and distanced in perpetuity, a shocking, horrible prospect.
The fact is that once the consequences of this virus in terms of their financial and health impact have long been addressed, the moral impact will remain ...
Now, I could understand it if we were a communist party, but this is the party that inherited the true wisdom of the Whig tradition.
This is the party of Margaret Thatcher who said that liberty was indivisible, this is the party that only recently elected a leader that they believed, that we believed, was a libertarian, there is much on which we are going to have to reflect.
Updated
Ashworth says the health secretary has been branded as “hopeless Hancock” by his own leader.
He says many voters will agree with Boris Johnson’s assessment.
When the government should have taken action to keep out the Indian variant, “they gave it the red carpet instead”.
Updated
Ashworth says, if test and trace remains in place, people who have been double vaccinated will be told to self-isolate. He suggests this will cause a problem.
Labour says ministers should admit that some measures will have to stay in place after July
Labour’s Chris Bryant intervenes to say ministers are misleading the nation, because even if Covid restrictions for England are lifted from 19 July, some laws will remain in force. (See 3.28pm.)
Ashworth say Bryant is making a good point.
He says there will be a need for some measures to remain in place after July.
And he says the government should explain whether or not they are making plans for measures to be introduced in the winter.
Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, said that Labour would be supporting the government in the vote tonight “with a heavy heart”.
Hancock confirms that vaccination to be compulsory for care home workers
Hancock confirms that the government is going to make vaccination a condition of employment for people in care homes. And he says it will consult on introducing this rule for NHS staff.
UPDATE: Hancock said:
I also want to tell the house about the results of our consultation on vaccination as a condition of deployment in care homes.
After careful consultation we’ve decided to take this proposal forward to protect residents.
The vast majority of staff in care homes are already vaccinated but not all, and we know that the vaccine not only protects you but protects those around you.
Therefore we will be taking forward the measures to ensure the mandation as a condition of deployment for staff in care homes and we will consult on the same approach in the NHS in order to save lives and protect patients from disease.
Updated
Hancock says MPs should return to sitting in chamber without social distancing from September
Hancock tells MPs that, although they will be voting tonight to extend the arrangements for virtual participation in Commons debates until 22 July, after the summer recess the Commons will return to normal. He says he can’t wait to have MPs back in the chamber “cheek by jowl”.
Hancock suggests state has less of a duty to protect people who have refused vaccine than to people not offered vaccine
In response to a question from Liam Fox (Con), Hancock says most of the people who are going into hospital at the moment with Covid are younger people who have not been vaccinated.
He says the state should offer the vaccine to everyone. But he says that the duty owed to someone who has been offered the vaccine but has refused it is not the same as the duty owed to people who have not been offered a vaccine.
Dame Andrea Leadsom (Con) says that if someone goes to a country with yellow fever without getting a yellow fever jab, then the government has no responsibility for their getting ill. She asks Hancock to confirm that when he means the state has less of a duty towards people who have refused a vaccine, he means it has no duty at all.
Hancock says he broadly agrees with Leadsom’s point, although he also says that if illness among unvaccinated people were to place the NHS under overwhelming pressure, the government would have to respond.
Updated
Hancock does not rule out self-isolation rules remaining compulsory until next year
Chris Bryant (Lab) asks if test and trace will be kept on a mandatory basis until March. Is that right? He says that does not happen with flu.
Hancock says people do stay at home if they have flu.
He also says the government is piloting a system that would allow people to use regular testing as an alternative to having to isolate. He says he is very attracted to that idea.
UPDATE: Later Bryant posted this on Twitter.
The Health Secretary @MattHancock says we will have to live with Covid after 19 July ‘like flu’. But it’s not going to be the same. Let’s be honest. Test and trace and compulsory self isolation will remain in place for many months for Covid. We’ve never had that for flu.
— Chris Bryant (@RhonddaBryant) June 16, 2021
Updated
Hancock says Delta variant now accounts for 96% of cases in UK
Hancock says step four is being delayed because of the Delta variant.
He says it spreads more easily, and there is some evidence that the risk of hospitalisation from the Delta variant is higher than from the Alpha variant.
(In fact, a report on Monday said the risk of hospitalisation was double.)
He says the Delta variant now accounts for 96% of cases in the UK.
Updated
Matt Hancock opens debate on delaying final easing of Covid restrictions for England
Matt Hancock is now opening the debate on delaying the final easing of Covid restrictions for England.
The first three steps on the roadmap were taken on time, he says.
But he says the fourth step is being delayed.
Ministers considering plan to encourage some working from home to continue after 19 July
Working from home guidance could stay in place for the long-haul as part of a raft of measures being considered by the government for life after the final stage of Boris Johnson’s roadmap, the Guardian has been told.
Sources confirmed a report in Politico’s Playbook today that ministers are likely not to encourage a full-scale return to the office, like they did last summer before being forced into a U-turn several months later.
Other findings in the document include that Perspex screens are ineffective at sufficiently stopping transmission of the disease, and that businesses could instead be required to maintain a minimum standard of ventilation.
No 10 has said the story “doesn’t reflect latest thinking”. And Boris Johnson downplayed it, saying in the Commons this afternoon: “It means absolutely nothing to me, our objective is to go forward with the roadmap and bring back the freedoms we love.”
A government insider insisted the proposals contained in a Whitehall paper had not been signed off by ministers or presented to a senior committee - such as the Covid Operations one.
But they said each of the policies suggested were “entirely plausible” and that multiple government departments had “been talking about these things”. They added:
We’re probably not going to announce any of that stuff in the next week or two. But will you likely see some of those policies coming out in the next month or two? Probably.
Ministers are said to be split over backing an immediate return to the office on 19 July, or remaining neutral or encouraging employers to adopt a “hybrid” model of remote and in-person working.
Yesterday Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, said that he thought partial working from home would become permanent for some people as restrictions were lifted.
Updated
More disruption could be looming for university students, after proposals by university managers to severely cut pension benefits were met with threats of a strike ballot by staff.
The University and College Union warned that their employers could face a strike ballot if they go ahead with large cuts in future pension payouts for current members of the University Superannuation Scheme (USS). But Universities UK, which represents most of the 300 employers enrolled in the USS, said the changes were needed to avoid steep increases in contributions from employers and staff.
The proposals between the USS trustees and UUK would significantly lower the salary threshold for a defined-benefit pension from £60,000 to £40,000 a year. The sides remain in dispute over the size of the USS’s likely deficit and how it was accounted for. The dispute has been running since 2018 and has caused national strikes that halted teaching in many places where universities were members of the scheme.
Jo Grady, general secretary of the UCU, said:
Members of the USS pension scheme appear to be trapped between an employer group that wants to cut pensions and a trustee that refuses to listen to scheme members or experts – all to meet a crisis in a pension scheme that doesn’t exist, based on a valuation that many have raised concerns about.
UUK needs to publish the individual employer responses to its pension proposals consultation, otherwise it will be seen as nothing more than a PR exercise readying the ground for more cuts.
For its part, UUK said: “We hope the union will work with us and suggest ways of tackling these immediate financial challenges to avoid ruinous contribution increases, and to explore longer-term changes, including a governance review, a flexible option for members and conditional indexation.”
No 10 denies claim that Johnson plans to quit after winning second general election
At the Downing Street lobby briefing the prime minister’s spokesman did not dispute the authenticity of the text messages from Boris Johnson published by Dominic Cummings.
Asked about the message from Johnson released by Cummings in which the PM described the work of Matt Hancock’s department as “totally fucking hopeless” (see 11.55am), the spokesman said:
I’m not planning to engage with every allegation put forward. The prime minister worked very closely with the health and care secretary throughout and continues to do so.
The spokesman said that Johnson has full confidence in Hancock.
But the spokesman did deny one of Cummings’s specific claims. Asked if Johnson intended to leave No 10 if he wins a second general election, the spokesman:
The PM has actually been asked this before and has said himself it’s utter nonsense, so that still stands. As you know, the PM was elected in 2019 and continues to focus on delivering the manifesto we were elected on and leading the county out of the pandemic.
The spokesman may have been referring to Johnson saying last summer that it was “nonsense” that he planned to stand down in six months. That claim had originally come from Sir Humphry Wakefield, Cummings’ father-in-law.
At PMQs Boris Johnson refused to answer a question from the SNP’s Ian Blackford about the latest allegations from Dominic Cummings. (See 12.23pm.) But Labour says Downing Street must address these claims. Justin Madders, the shadow health minister, said:
This is more evidence that the Conservatives were too slow to lockdown, too slow to deliver PPE and too slow to protect our care homes.
With this evidence that even the PM thinks Hancock is useless, why in the worst pandemic in our history has he left him in charge?
Hancock and Johnson need to respond to these latest revelations and immediately start the public inquiry into their handling of the pandemic.
Here is the story from my colleagues Jessica Elgot and Aubrey Allegretti on Cummings’ allegations.
Updated
Back in the Commons, in response to a question from the Conservative former cabinet minister Damian Green, Boris Johnson said that any vaccines donated to poorer countries in 2022 would be in addition to the existing budget for aid.
Johnson plans to leave No 10 two years after next election at latest, Cummings claims
In his mammoth blog, Dominic Cummings says Boris Johnson is planning to leave No 10 two years, at the latest, after the next election. Cumming says:
The public inquiry cannot fix this. It will not start for years and it is designed to punt the tricky parts until after this PM has gone — unlike other PMs, this one has a clear plan to leave at the latest a couple of years after the next election, he wants to make money and have fun not ‘go on and on’. So we either live with chronic dysfunction for another ~5 years or some force intervenes.
Cummings does not explain the source of his claim, although given how close he was to Boris Johnson in his first months as an adviser at No 10, it seems likely that he heard this from Johnson first hand.
However, it is also worth remembering that Johnson does have a habit of telling people what they want to hear; there are many people in his cabinet who would have been relieved to hear that he planned to fight just one more general election.
Also, being prime minister is a thrilling job, and there is a long history of people arriving in No 10 with the intention of giving up at a certain point but deciding, when the time comes close, that they will hang on for just a bit longer.
Many people in Westminster now assume the next election will take place in 2023, and so if Johnson were to stick to this timetable, he would be out by the end of 2025.
Updated
Here are screengrabs of the messages published by Dominic Cummings today on his blog.
Liz Saville Roberts, the Plaid Cymru leader at Westminster, says that under the trade deal with Australia, from day one Australian farmers will be able to export 60 times more beef without tariffs. Will the government publish an annual assessment of the impact on British farmers?
Sky’s Ed Conway explains this point in a very good Twitter thread starting here.
What kind of impact will the Australia-UK trade deal have? Short answer is we don’t know, in part because we still have scant detail abt it, in part cos it generally takes a LONG time for these deals to be felt in our lives.
— Ed Conway (@EdConwaySky) June 15, 2021
Even so, I think this is a big deal, for a few reasons:
And here are two tweets on the tariff point.
Consider: here are 2019 beef/sheepmeat imports from Australia. The yellow lines show you the current quotas, above which restrictions on trade kick in. Quite low, right? But now have a look at what happens the minute the trade deal is signed… pic.twitter.com/H8cHnOO2xL
— Ed Conway (@EdConwaySky) June 15, 2021
When the deal is signed those quotas are catapulted dramatically higher (SEVEN times higher in the case of beef imports). This is not gradual. It’s a very sudden and sharp shift which *may* be reflected in an influx of beef imports, which could put British farmers out of business pic.twitter.com/Kf5FWRsKE7
— Ed Conway (@EdConwaySky) June 15, 2021
In response, Johnson ignores Saville Roberts’s main point. He claims that complete tariff-free access will not happen until after 15 years, and he says Australian animal welfare standards are very high.
Updated
Sir Bernard Jenkin (Con) says President Macron admitted that the Northern Ireland protocol contained inconsistencies. If it is undermining peace, it must be renegotiated, he says.
Johnson says the problem is with the application of the protocol. The protocol itself says that there should be no distortion of trade, and that the Good Friday agreement must be upheld.
Andrew Mitchell (Con), the former international development secretary, says Tories like him opposed to the aid cuts are not leftwing propagandists, as the PM claimed at PMQs claimed last week.
Johnson says no leader raised the aid cuts last week. He says people congratulated him on what the government was doing.
Ian Blackford, the SNP leader at Westminster, says the photo opportunities in Cornwall could not hide the fact that Britain is “deeply diminished on the world stage”.
What was really on display was Brexit Britain, a more isolated, and less influential place, he says.
In his response to Starmer, Johnson accuses the Labour party of “miserablism”.
And he says he does not know what Starmer actually wants on the NI protocol. (On Monday Starmer suggested the checks required by the protocol should go.)
Updated
G7 was 'wasted opportunity' because Johnson failed to show leadership, Starmer says
Sir Keir Starmer is responding to Johnson.
A Labour government, and a Labour foreign secretary, Ernest Bevin, helped found Nato. So Labour will always value it, he says.
On the trade deal with Australia, he says the devil will be in the detail. Labour looks forward to scrutinising it.
This G7 should have been the most important for a generation. It was the first in the recovery, and the first with a new US president.
But it was a “wasted opportunity”, he says.
He says the WHO says 11bn doses are needed to vaccinate poorer countries. But the summit delivered less than a tenth of that.
The headlines about 1bn doses may have been what the PM wanted. But it was not what the world needed.
The summit was meant to be a stepping stone to Cop26. But, if anything, it was a step back.
And there was nothing on the Middle East peace process, or what might be done to establish a Palestinian state.
He says Johnson should also have used the summit to make progress on the Northern Ireland protocol. But he didn’t.
When a prime minister loses the trust of our allies, and trashes Britain’s reputation for holding upholding international law, it’s hardly surprising that we’re left isolated and unable to lead.
Starmer says the G7 delivered what the PM wanted: good headlines, nice photos, and a row with the French over sausages.
But that shows how narrow the PM’s ambitions were. He was hosting, not leading, the G7. He was acting not as a leader, but as a tour guide.
Updated
Johnson's statement on G7 and Nato summits
Boris Johnson is now making a statement on the G7 and Nato summits.
He starts by thanking the people of Cornwall for hosting the summit. They wanted to demonstrate how the world’s democracies are ready to tackle the world’s toughest problems, he says. He says the G7 will tackle Covid, prepare the world for another pandemic and bring back better.
He is now summarising the main conclusions from the G7. They were set out here, in the final communique (pdf).
The G7 will devise a fairer tax system, he says, ending the race to the bottom.
And they will act as one against an increasing injustice, the denial of an education to girls around the world.
The G7 resolved to end any government support for unabated coal-fired power stations overseas, he says.
The G7 will devote 30% of land and sea to nature.
There is no contradiction between tackling climate change and creating high-paid jobs, he says.
On Monday he and Scott Morrison, the Australian PM, agreed the trade deal, he said.
The countries at Carbis Bay were a “democratic 11”, he says. The democratic ideals were set out in the Atlantic charter in 1941, signed when the UK was the only surviving democracy in Europe, and Johnson says he and Joe Biden signed an update within sight of HMS Prince of Wales, the linear descendant of the vessel Churchill used in 1941.
On Nato, Johnson says the UK contributes more to the alliance than any other country in Europe.
Updated
Owen Thompson (SNP) asks why the PM is willing to put the prospects of Scottish farmers and crofters in peril.
Johnson says he does not accept that that is what the Australia trade deal will do.
Kirsten Oswald (SNP) says the trade deal with Australia will undercut farmers, shortchange consumers and lower animal welfare standards.
Johnson says this trade deal is the first ever done by the government to actually incorporate high animal welfare standards.
Stuart McDonald (SNP) says the universal credit rules risk forcing people into poverty.
Johnson says the whole point of UC is to get people into work.
William Wragg (Con) asks when Sage members will start giving media performances again to depress morale.
Johnson says people need to learn to live with Covid.
Johnson says deaths from fires are coming down. He says MPs should not suggest all high-rise blocks are dangerous.
Ruth Edwards (Con) asks if the PM will look closely at the ideas in the TIGRR report. (See 9.39am.)
Johnson says it is an excellent report.
Julian Smith (Con), the former Northern Ireland secretary, asks if the PM agrees that it is vital that the parties in Northern Ireland form a new administration and implement the agenda in the New Decade, New Approach document.
Johnson says he supports that approach. He wants to see a stable executive formed, he says.
Philip Davies (Con) says deaths are running below the five-year average. So why, instead of trusting the common sense of the British people, he instead trusts experts like Susan Michie, a long-standing member of the Communist party, who wants restrictions to last for ever.
Johnson says no one wants restrictions to last for ever.
Johnson says Scotland needs a different type of MP from SNP MPs. It needs MPs willing to champion Scotland, he says.
Johnson restates threat to suspend parts of 'totally disproportionate' NI protocol if EU does not compromise
Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, the DUP leader at Westminster, asks the PM to confirm that the EU Withdrawal Act and the Northern Ireland protocol has not amounted to an implied repeal of article 6 of the Act of Union, which protects trade between NI and GB.
Johnson confirms that. And he says unless there is progress on implementation of the protocol, which is currently “totally disproportionate”, then he will have to take the “necessary steps” to protect trade in the way Donaldson wants.
That could mean unilaterally extending the “grace period” that allows an exemption for chilled meats, or even invoking article 16 of the protocol, that would allow parts of the protocol to be suspended.
Ian Blackford, the SNP leader at Westminster, also starts by paying tribute to Jo Cox. And he condemns the treatment of the BBC journalist Nick Watt by anti-lockdown protesters.
He says the PM should clarify whether the text message revealed by Dominic Cummings is genuine. (See 11.55am.)
He says Scottish governments have been sold out by the Australian trade deal.
He asks the PM to confirm the amounts of beef to be allowed in from day one tariff free.
Johnson says Scottish farmers will benefit from this deal. Food worth £350m is already exported to Australia. This is a chance to increase that.
Blackford says even the PM cannot believe that “tripe”. He says Australia will benefit to the tune of $1.3bn a year from the deal. But the UK economy will only grow by 0.02% of GDP. He says the UK would need 200 of these deals to make up for Brexit.
Johnson says tripe sales can be increased under this deal. If Blackford wants to return to the EU, he is out of his mind, he says.
Starmer says what matters is what is needed now. The PM’s indecision at the borders has blown it. We have heard this all before. Remember ‘turn the tide in 12 weeks’, and ‘it will all be over by Christmas’, and June 21 being freedom day.
The British people don’t expect miracles but they do expect basic competence and honesty.
He asks why anyone should believe Johnson now.
Johnson asks why anyone should believe Starmer now.
He says the UK would not have been able to do the vaccine rollout if the UK had stayed in the EMA, and it would not have been able to control borders if the UK had stayed in the EU, as Labour wanted.
(Neither of those two claims is true - at least, if by ‘control borders’ Johnson meant from Covid, which is what he implied in the context.)
Starmer says the worse it gets for the PM, the more pathetic he gets. He asks if the PM really think the 20,000 people who came from India while he delayed putting it on the red list were bringing in vital medical supplies or food.
He says, as Dominic Cummings claimed, Johnson did not want a proper border policy.
When will the PM give proper support for businesses, as the Labour government is doing in Wales?
Johnson says the government is continuing to support businesses. But the economy is recovering. He says the government will look after business “all the way”.
Starmer says if the PM put as much effort into protecting borders as he does into coming up with “ridiculous excuses”, we would be opening up next week.
He urges the PM to drop the traffic light system, secure the borders and save the British summer.
Johnson claims the PM does not know what the Delta variant is. If Labour wants to stop all travel into the country, then that is a flip-flop, and pointless. He says 75% of medicines and 50% of food comes from abroad.
Starmer says the rate of the Delta variant is higher here than in other countries. If the border policy is so strong, why is that?
Johnson says Labour should pulp its document, which is wrong about the Delta variant. The government put India on the red list on 23 April, before the Delta variant was even identified, he says.
Starmer says this is absurd. He says he repeatedly urged the PM to take tougher actions on the border. What is the PM’s explanation for the spread of the Delta variant?
Johnson quotes from what he says is a Labour briefing saying the Delta variant was identified on 1 April. But that is not the Delta variant, he says. That was the Kappa variant.
He says the UK has vaccinated almost 79% of the adult population. This would not have happened under Labour, he claims, because it wanted to stay in the European Medicines Agency.
Sir Keir Starmer says this week also marks the fourth anniversary of the Grenfell Tower fire. It is an outrage that more than 200 high-rise flats still have Grenfell-style cladding, he says.
And he says he entered parliament at the same time as Jo Cox. She was a friend. He says Labour MPs misses her every day.
Does the PM accept that failing to put India on the red list contributed to the spead of the Delta variant?
Johnson says that is wrong. He says the Delta variant was not identified as a variant of concern until after the red list decision was taken.
Sir Robert Neill (Con) asks the PM to use the expertise of the British legal system in developing his G7 agenda.
Johnson says the legal services industry is a key part of the economy.
Johnson starts by saying it is five years since the murder of Jo Cox, and he says the thoughts of MPs are with her family.
As soon as PMQs is over, Boris Johnson will be making a statement on the G7 and Nato summits.
Cummings releases text apparently showing PM saying Hancock was 'hopeless' on vaccines
Dominic Cummings, the former chief adviser to Boris Johnson, appears to have been goaded by the complaints from Jeremy Hunt, the chair of the Commons health committee, and Greg Clark, the chair of the Commons science committee, about his failure to provide evidence to back up the allegations he made about Matt Hancock last month. He has just posted on Twitter a screenshot of what is apparently a text message from Boris Johnson describing the performance of Hancock’s department on testing in March last year as “totally fucking hopeless”.
86/ Evidence on the covid disaster: as the PM said himself, Hancock's performance on testing, procurement, PPE, care homes etc was 'totally fucking hopeless', & his account to MPs was fiction: https://t.co/lur4Ddrddy pic.twitter.com/JVGLCSov7v
— Dominic Cummings (@Dominic2306) June 16, 2021
There is more - a lot more - in this post on substack. It runs to 7,000 words.
Cummings has also posted this on Twitter.
87/ A few simple Qs to ask the PM: pic.twitter.com/a7ZsW4wjRY
— Dominic Cummings (@Dominic2306) June 16, 2021
Updated
Vaccines likely to become less effective against infection, but effectiveness against hospitalisation matters most, MPs told
Prof Sir Andrew Pollard, director of the Oxford Vaccine Group, told the Commons science committee, that the public crisis would be “over” if the vaccines continued to protect against hospital admissions in the future.
What we’ve been waiting for over the last month with the Delta variant is to find out whether with two doses of the vaccine we have good protection against hospitalisation.
And the data that came out on Monday from Public Health England that show over 90% protection against hospitalisation is incredibly reassuring in that regard.
That’s the key bit that we have to look at with future variants, if that very high protection against hospitalisation continues, despite spread in the community, then the public health crisis is over.
Pollard also said that over time the vaccines would become less effective against symptomatic illness. But he said what mattered most was effectiveness against hospitalisation, and he said people would “go mad” if they worried too much about falling effectiveness against illness. He explained:
What the virus is doing is it’s evolving away from immunity, and we’re seeing lower effectiveness against symptomatic infection.
If we wind the clock forward to a year or two from now, one would expect those numbers to get lower and lower, because unless the virus disappears from the planet, which I don’t think is to happen, it will have to be able to survive in vaccinated populations.
If we focus on effectiveness against symptomatic disease in the future, we’ll go mad because those numbers will get lower and lower over time because that is the only way the virus survives.
So the really important question is: ‘What does effectiveness against hospitalisation look like?’ And it’s really encouraging so far, and I think we’re all hoping it will stay like that.
Earlier Dr Susan Hopkins explained to the committee why new variants are almost by definition more transmissible or more vaccine-immune than the ones they replace. (See 10.43am.)
Public Health England measures the effectiveness of vaccines on a whole range of measures, including against hospitalisation and against symptomatic illness. Here is the table from last week’s PHE report on vaccine effectiveness (pdf) (although it measures performance mostly against the Alpha variant, not the Delta variant).
Providers and representatives from the care sector are understood to be meeting with officials from the Department of Health and Social Care at midday to discuss the issue of mandatory vaccinations for care home workers, PA Media reports.
PHE official suggests masks might have to remain compulsory after 19 July for longer public transport trips
In her evidence to the Commons science committee, Dr Susan Hopkins, chief medical adviser, NHS Test and Trace and deputy director of Public Health England’s National Infection Service, suggested that wearing masks might have to be compulsory for people on public transport for more than 15 minutes after 19 July, the date when regulations are supposed to end.
Asked by the Conservative MP Aaron Bell what “non-pharmaceutical interventions” (NPIs, or restrictions) might have to remain in place after 19 July, she said that a lot of this would come down to social responsibility, and people taking decisions on things such as masks for themselves. But she went on:
This is a balance. In some countries, like Sweden, they have done a lot through social responsibility. In other countries they have legislated heavily.
So I think there is a middle road, as we have vaccination heavily rolled out, that requires potentially, in some areas where there is higher risk, to look at them [NPIs, or restrictions]. One might consider, for example, transport; for those of use who pack ourselves into the tube regularly, we may feel more comfortable if everyone else was asked to wear a mask for those very close encounters for potentially periods longer than 15 minutes.
But in more general societal areas, such as shops, I think it is going to come down to personal opinions and responsibilities, rather than legislation, for the longer term.
Updated
UK 'not making much progress' towards resolving NI protocol dispute with EU, says Frost
Lord Frost, the Brexit minister, told the Commons Northern Ireland affairs committee that the UK and the EU were making little progress towards resolving their dispute about the Northern Ireland protocol.
He said discussions were going on all the time with Brussels about this. But he went on:
It’s happening all the time, it’s just that we are not making much progress despite all the ideas that we have put in.
Frost said that the UK wanted to find a negotiated solution to the dispute if he could. But he would not rule out the UK taking unilateral measures, such as extending the “grace period” allowing chilled meats from Britain (including sausages) to be sold in Northern Ireland without the EU’s agreement. He said:
We’d prefer to find negotiated ways forwards if we can. If that’s not possible, obviously other options remain on the table, as the PM said over the weekend.
Frost also said that the issue had become more difficult because of the “weakening of consent” for the protocol arrangements in unionist groups. He said:
The difficulty that we have had since the start of the year, or at least the end of January, is there has been a very visible weakening of consent in one community in Northern Ireland for the arrangements in the protocol and that’s obviously produced instability and uncertainty.
In her evidence to the Commons science committee about the Delta variant (see 10.14am), Dr Susan Hopkins also pointed out that new variants, almost by definition, will be more transmissible or more vaccine-immune than the variants they are replacing. She explained:
We’re living in a world of variants now, so everything we see is a variation of the original.
Actually every [variant] we see that’s going to live and not become extinct very rapidly, is either going to have a transmissibility advantage or an immune evading advantage.
And so the challenge always is trying to understand which one of these is going to do something as it emerges.
She said that at the moment 25 variants were “under monitoring” and eight “under investigation”. She went on:
All of them have mutations that we’re concerned about, but mutations alone is not enough to predict whether it’s really going to impact on our journey through vaccines and impact on the public health risk of hospitalisation.
Delta variant could have R number as high as 7 without mitigating measures in place, MPs told
At the Commons science committee Dr Susan Hopkins, chief medical adviser, NHS Test and Trace and deputy director of Public Health England’s National Infection Service, has just given MPs a series of figures to explain why scientists believe the Delta variant (first identified in India) is much more transmissible than the Alpha variant (first identified in Kent).
- The growth rate of Delta has increased by between 40% and 80%, compared to Alpha, Hopkins said.
- Household infection rates suggest the chances of transmission within a household are 66% greater for Delta compared to Alpha, she said.
- The secondary attack rate (the rate of spread to close contacts) for Delta is about 30 to 40% higher than it is for Alpha, she said.
- Without any mitigating measures in place, R, the reproduction number for Delta, would be over 5, and maybe up to 7, she said. She said when coronavirus first appeared, the equivalent figure for the version then in circulation was 2.5. (This figure is also known as R0, or R naught. It is no the same as the R number published weekly, which is the estimate of the how the virus is reproducing taking into account the impact of the mitigating measures in place.)
Hopkins said Delta had “much greater transmissibility” than Alpha, and the Alpha variant itself was much more transmissible than the version of the virus originally circulating last spring.
Updated
Lord Frost, the Brexit minister, has just started giving evidence to the Commons Northern Ireland affairs committee about the Northern Ireland protocol. The government agreed to the protocol as part of its Brexit negotiation with the EU, but now it has delayed implementation of parts of the protocol and it is arguing that some of its provisions (like the chilled meat rules that are said to amount to a proposed ban on the sale of British sausages in Northern Ireland) are unacceptable.
As my colleague Lisa O’Carroll reports, Simon Hoare, the Conservative MP who chairs the committee, opened the session by asking Frost to confirm who signed the protocol in the first place.
Simon Hoare, chair of Northern Ireland affairs committee opens session with Lord Frost because of some confusion in the media.
— lisa o'carroll (@lisaocarroll) June 16, 2021
"Her Majesty's government negotiated with the European Union. The Northern Ireland protocol"
Lord Frost gives long preamble about being happy to be here
Hoare: Turning back to the Q could you confirm that HMG negotiated with the EU the NI protocol?
— lisa o'carroll (@lisaocarroll) June 16, 2021
Lord Frost: It was I working with the PM negotiated the protocol.
Hoare: Presume HMG understood the NIP and what it signed up to?
Frost: Indeed. we had a very clear understanding
Hoare: You signed off the NIP?
— lisa o'carroll (@lisaocarroll) June 16, 2021
Frost: NIP signed off in 2020 the joint committee hich which sort of expand and interpret it as, as I said, CDL
Hoare: So nobody was blind sided by this?
Frost: We all had a good understanding of the decisions.
(This almost like a comedy opener)
CDL is the chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Michael Gove, who signed an agreement with the EU on how to implement the protocol after the the original document was negotiated.
Johnson welcomes report on options for regulatory reform after Brexit
The Brexiter wing of the Conservative party argued for leaving the EU partly on the grounds that EU regulations were holding back British business. But in the referendum campaign in 2016, and afterwards, they found it hard to identify EU rules that were a major source of trouble. For example, at one point, in a speech addressing this issue, the best Boris Johnson could do was come up with a false claim about kipper packaging.
But in February Johnson asked three Tory MPs - Sir Iain Duncan Smith, Theresa Villiers and George Freeman - to produce a report on how regulations might be changed after Brexit. They were called the Taskforce on Innovation, Growth and Regulatory Reform , and their report has been published this morning. It’s here (pdf).
In an open letter welcoming the report, Johnson said the government would give the plans detailed consideration. He said:
I asked you to re-imagine, quickly and creatively, the UK’s approach to regulation and make best use of our recently rediscovered freedoms. You have more than delivered on that charge, responding with substantive plans that will really put a TIGRR in the tank of British business.
It is obvious that the UK’s innovators and entrepreneurs can lead the world in the economy of the future, creating new opportunities and greater prosperity along the way, and levelling up our whole country in the process. But your report makes it equally clear that, whether in data reform or clinical trials, offshore wind or autonomous vehicles, this can only happen if we clear a path through the thicket of burdensome and restrictive regulation that has grown up around our industries over the past half century.
The government, through our better regulation committee, is already hard at work on reform of the UK’s regulatory framework. Your bold proposals provide a valuable template for this, illustrating the sheer level of ambitious thinking needed to usher in a new golden age of growth and innovation right across the UK.
Mujtaba Rahman, the Brexit specialist at the Eurasia consultancy, says the ideas in the report do not seem to justify leaving the EU.
The Tforce on Innovation, Growth & Reg Reform has reported to @BorisJohnson on how UK can “reshape regulation“ & “seize new opps from Brexit“. The “dividend“: Reduce barriers for start ups, make most of tech & ensure UK “remains“ biz friendly
— Mujtaba Rahman (@Mij_Europe) June 15, 2021
All compatible w/EU membership then
21 and 22-year-olds in England to start getting texts inviting them for jab from today
Almost 1 million people in England aged 21 and 22 still start getting texts today inviting them to book a coronavirus vaccine appointment, NHS England said this morning. It said:
As the NHS works through the final cohorts, people aged 21 and 22 will now be able to book themselves in for a coronavirus vaccine, leaving only 18 to 20-year-olds yet to get the call.
Some 972,000 texts will be sent out from today inviting them to book in their jab, with the national booking system opening to allow them to make appointments for both doses.
Updated
Ministers face backlash from England’s care sector over plans to make jabs compulsory for staff
Good morning. As my colleague Denis Campbell reported last night, Covid vaccinations are to become mandatory for care home staff under plans to be announced by ministers. The government is also considering making them compulsory for all NHS staff, but this decision would be even more contentious, and the final decision does not seem to have yet been taken.
This morning senior figures from the care sector have expressed concern about the plan for compulsory jabs.
Vic Rayner, chief executive of the National Care Forum, told BBC Breakfast that giving staff just 16 weeks to get vaccinated, or else risk losing their job, would not give the sector enough time to adapt. She said:
If there is this 16-week window then that really is a very short period of time for people to make the kind of changes that are needed.
Mike Padgham, chairman of the Independent Care Group (ICG), which represents care homes in Yorkshire, said this would make it even harder for care homes to recruit staff. He told the Today programme:
I’m disappointed because I think persuasion is the way forward still because those taking the vaccination has gone up but I also say that I do believe people should be vaccinated, every member of staff should take up the vaccine ... I just think persuasion rather than coercion or compulsion is the way we have to deal with it.
What I’m worried about is the recruitment crisis already in social care, is that we’re frightened that this is going to put more people off coming into social care and that’s going to be difficult.
And Rachel Harrison, the GMB union’s national officer for public services, said:
Carers have been at the forefront of this pandemic, risking their lives to keep our loved ones safe, often enduring almost Victorian working standards in the process.
The government could do a lot to help them: address their pay terms and conditions, increasing the rate of and access to contractual sick pay, banning zero hours, and ensuring more mobile NHS vaccination teams so those working night shifts can get the jab.
Instead, ministers are ploughing ahead with plans to strongarm care workers into taking the vaccine without taking seriously the massive blocks these workers still face in getting jabbed.
This looks like another potential avoidable mess. We’ve told ministers that more than a third of our members in social care would consider packing their jobs in if vaccines were mandated. They can’t now say they weren’t warned.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: Lord Frost, the Brexit minister, gives evidence to the Commons Northern Ireland committee.
9.30am: Dr Susan Hopkins, chief medical adviser to NHS Test and Trace, Prof Sir Andrew Pollard, director of the Oxford Vaccine Group, and Prof Wendy Barclay, head of the infectious disease department at Imperial College London, give evidence to the Commons science committee.
12pm: Boris Johnson faces Sir Keir Starmer at PMQs.
12.30pm: Johnson makes a Commons statement about the G7 and Nato summits.
After 2pm: MPs begin debating the regulations to delay the lifting of final Covid restrictions another four weeks, until 19 July. The vote will be at 7pm.
3pm: Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, gives a speech to the Festival of Education.
Politics Live has been a mix of Covid and non-Covid news recently, and that will be the case today. I will be focusing particularly on PMQs, Johnson’s statement and the Covid debate.
For other Covid developments, do read our global live blog. It’s here.
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.
Updated
