London and the south east cut off from rest of the country
UK outward freight to Calais cut off
UK travel prohibited for a swathe of countries
More cases reported in last 24 hours than ever before
5 days til Christmas
11 days til the transition ends
on the transition point- the argument always was that a pandemic was so unpredictable that a Brexit extension was necessary. If things go very wrong over the next few weeks, expect that to become a very live political issue.
Charles Walker, Vice Chair of the 1922 Tory backbench committee in the Commons tells TWTW that he thinks the government knew it intended to “cancel” Christmas on Wednesday or Thursday but waited for Parliament to rise to do it. Says many of his colleagues find this “egregious.”
When put to Walker that Matt Hancock said this morning that wasn’t the case, it was the briefing on Friday which prompted the decision, Walker says: “Hmm yeah...well I’d have to disagree with the SoS on that.” So he’s either saying Hancock isn’t being truthful or is misinformed.
Walker: “Surely at some stage a senior government minister has say I’ve offered my resignation to the Prime Minister and the Prime Minister has to say- very early I’ve had to accept this.”
Reminder- Charles Walker is Vice Chair of the Tory backbench committee.
NEW: Gavin Williamson has sent this letter to headteachers tonight. It contains his response to the unions’ testing statement. He maintains schools are not “driving transmission” of the virus and reiterates his determination to roll out testing but confirms it is “voluntary”.
But as @Peston has pointed out SAGE had estimated that closing secondaries would reduce R by 0.35. Seems inconceivable some form of closure won’t at least be up for discussion if things continue to decline.
Williamson goes on to say schools offering testing will be provided with PPE, “reasonable costs” for the workforce required, army involvement, an additional inset day and “guidance and training for schools”
Still no further detail on where the workforce is going to come from.
Sturgeon: "We do now face a very serious situation. It is probably the most serious and potentially dangerous juncture we have faced since the start of the Covid pandemic in Feb and March...it means we have to act accordingly."
Sturgeon: "The advantage that we have in Scotland unlike some other parts of the UK right now is that we still have the chance to act on a preventative basis."
"We do not yet know how widely this strain of the virus is circling in Scotland. The latest info is that 17 cases have been identified in Scotland through genomic sequencing. But we have to be realistic that that is probably an underestimate."
There is a much emphasis being placed on the new strain. Scientists better placed to comment on that. Data is uncertain so precautionary principle should kick in and it has.
But it doesn't mean questions about previous policy are annulled-far from it.
Because the point is we were going into this where London wasn't in a good place to resist this new strain
Q1) Why was London, where cases were already high- put into T2 when lockdown ended? See graph below. Cases were already climbing during the end of lockdown itself.
Q2) You can extend that to the rest of the country. We left lockdown with cases much higher than after the first. This graph is for England. Many said at the time cases were still too high to enter tiers and that the tiers couldn't be guaranteed to sustain it, new strain or not.
NEW RESTRICTIONS ON LONDON AND SOUTH EAST AND EAST IN T3
These areas will effectively be in November national lockdown
-people must stay at home
-retail to close
-indoor gyms, leisure to close
-personal care services
-work from home
-no enter or leaving T4
-no staying overnight
-Communal worship an take place in T4
New advice on travel
-All people in all tiers should stay local
-Those in T4 cannot travel abroad save for work
Christmas
-In T4 no-one should mix with anyone outside their own households
-support bubbles stay in place
BIG: Christmas mixing now only permitted across rest of the country on Christmas Day itself