EXCL: Queen’s Speech will include reference to plans to give UK ministers the power to unilaterally ditch key parts of the Northern Ireland Protocol, three government sources told LBC. Proposals would allow ministers to suspend Irish Sea checks. lbc.co.uk/news/governmen… The speech will vow to protect the Good Friday Agreement - a reference to the highly controversial legislation being drawn up - though it’s not expected to include a standalone bill on the Protocol.

I was told by Tory MPs, at the height of the Rashford row, that members of the govt were threatening to withhold money from schools in their (deprived) constituencies if they voted to extend free school meals. These practices aren’t new but Will Wragg has shone a light on them. This was in Oct 2020 when Labour was forcing a vote on free school meals & some Tory MPs were threatening to vote with Labour (5 did so). There was a lot of strong-arming of Tory MPs including these threats. I included it in coverage of the story at the time. Govt later U-turned.

Dominic Cummings sets the tone from the start, with his first words being to say that senior government ministers and advisers “fell disastrously short of the standards that the public has a right to expect of its government in a crisis like this”. 17 minutes in and Dominic Cummings has already twice made the point that Boris Johnson went on holiday as the pandemic was taking off in February.

EXCL: 110 direct flights from India have landed in UK since it was placed on the Red List on 23rd April. Analysis suggests almost 8,500 travellers from India have arrived in UK since then. No flight ban in place from India, unlike 11 other "Red" countries inc. Brazil & S. Africa. Latest NHS data suggests 7% of those tested after arriving from India test positive - likely to be equate to around 600 people since India was added to Red List on 23rd April. Half of positive tests from India arrivals that are sequenced are infected with a worrying variant.

Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick tells the Commons: "A lot of young British Jews are discovering for the first time that their friends don't understand antisemitism, can't recognise it and don't care that they are spreading it." "They are not responsible for the actions of a govt. thousands of miles away but are made to feel as if they are. Seeing their friends post social media content that glorifies Hamas -an illegal, terrorist organisation, whose charter calls for every Jew in the world to be killed."

Independent SAGE member @chrischirp absolutely fuming on LBC. She tells @eddiemair after today's press conference: "It just made me so angry because they've been doing this for weeks and weeks as if people just aren't obeying the rules. That's not what's happening... 1/ "...the rules are just much laxer this time than in March: we've got loads more people going to work, we've got more kids in school, we've got more shops allowed to be open. If they don't want people to go out and transmit the virus then change the rules and stop blaming people."

Weekend papers were full of predictions of 500,000 vaccinations a day this week. It's going to take a huge step change to reach that: today's figure is just over 200,000 - almost exactly the same as it was last Tuesday. Big drop from end of last week, when it topped 300,000. We shouldn't read too much into single day figures but it's clear the trend has slowed over the last few days having increased a lot last week. Doesn't mean it won't pick up again in the next few days - it ought to, significantly, based on what ministers have said.

Ministers will soon have a huge decision to make. Throughout the pandemic the overriding aim of government policy has been to stop the NHS being overwhelmed. At some point in the spring, thanks to the vaccines, that risk will likely be averted. 1/10 In the coming weeks, hospitalisations & deaths should start to fall quite significantly as more vulnerable people are vaccinated. But vaccination will have less impact on cases (for now), because cases are disproportionately among younger groups. 2/10

More people have now been vaccinated in the UK then have tested positive in the UK since the pandemic started. Breakdown:
1st dose: 3,559,179
2nd dose: 447,261

Total UK positive tests: 3,357,361

Pfizer says there is “no data” to suggest that people are properly protected after just one dose of its vaccine, as U.K. scientists and politicians have said: “The safety and efficacy of the vaccine has not been evaluated on different dosing schedules.” “Pfizer believes it is critical that health authorities conduct surveillance efforts on any alternative schedules implemented and to ensure each recipient is afforded the maximum possible protection, which means immunization with two doses of the vaccine.”

Vaccine procurement figures didn't stand up for long. "10 million" from Pfizer by the end of the year seems to have turned into "800,000 in December and then 🤷‍♂️"... It's not actually helpful to talk about doses when each person needs two. To be clear, 800,000 doses is enough vaccine for 400,000 people.

NEW: Extraordinary document just published by SAGE sub-committee SPI-B (which focuses on behavioral science) on what it calls the risks of "widespread urban disorder" this summer. 1/ Government scientific advisers warn that there has been a "step change" in the threat of serious riots since 2011 but that police "are in a far weaker position" to respond. As a result, the response to any disorder "would be likely to require military support".

Excess mortality figures released by @ONS today are very interesting. Top line: UK has the highest figures of all the countries looked at. Not good. But what's especially interesting is that this includes countries who had much higher excess mortality at the peak than the UK. 1/ In other words, UK fared worst not because it had the most cases at the peak but b/c it took longest to get those numbers down. Lots of possible reasons for this, but two seem key:
1. Less strict lockdown than elsewhere
2. Major problem of transmission in hospitals & care homes

Government swiftly rejects Intelligence and Security Committee's call for an independent inquiry into Russian interference in the 2016 Brexit referendum. Government response says: "A retrospective assessment of the EU referendum is not necessary". Government says it constantly reviews new evidence of foreign interference and so a "retrospective" inquiry isn't needed. But the ISC said government and intelligence agencies found no evidence of interference in Brexit vote because they had never looked for it.

Two new studies have just been published on how face coverings can help stop the spread of Covid-19. They are fascinating, and raise serious questions about UK government policy on this.

THREAD/ The first is a joint study by the Royal Academy and Royal Society - two of the UK’s leading scientific bodies. It finds - who knew - that face coverings are “effective in reducing source virus transmission” and help protect both the wearer and those aroud them.

On care homes being told there was no risk to residents, Jenny Harries says: "At that time we did not recognise there was any sustained community transmission." BUT more than a month before, SAGE members had concluded there was a "realistic probability of sustained transmission". The advice telling care homes that infections were "very unlikely" was published on 25th Feb and withdrawn on 13th March. But weeks earlier, the modelling sub-committee of SAGE had already concluded this:

Policing minister Kit Malthouse tells the Commons: "When we emerge from this crisis that's engulfing our country, I think there will be a general reassessment about who is important in this country." Wow. Now Tory MP Steve Double says "many people that we consider to be low skilled are actually pretty crucial to the smooth running of our country". Calls on Priti Patel to review the new points-based immigration system "to reflect the things we've learnt during this time".