This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.

You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2020/may/19/uk-coronavirus-live-latest-updates

The article has changed 21 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.

Version 13 Version 14
UK coronavirus live: country facing 'severe recession likes of which we haven't seen', says Rishi Sunak UK coronavirus live: George Eustice takes daily briefing as Sunak warns country facing 'severe recession'
(32 minutes later)
Overall deaths in England and Wales in week up to 8 May were down for the third week in a row, at 12,657Overall deaths in England and Wales in week up to 8 May were down for the third week in a row, at 12,657
George Eustice, the environment secretary, is taking the UK government’s afternoon press conference. It is about to start. He will be with Prof Dame Angela McLean, the government’s deputy chief scientific adviser.
Half a dozen people from three Premier League football clubs have tested positive for Covid-19 in two days.
With hopes of top-flight football resuming next month, the Premier League announced six players or staff returned positive results in its first two days of testing.
The league carried out 748 tests on Sunday and Monday, as part of a process designed to allow matches to restart next month. Squads were allowed to return to training today, carried out according to physical distancing. It is understood the league is awaiting results from at least one more club.
The league said in a statement: “The Premier League can today confirm that, on Sunday 17 May and Monday 18 May, 748 players and club staff were tested for Covid-19. Of these, six have tested positive from three clubs. Players or club staff who have tested positive will now self-isolate for a period of seven days.
The league had been hoping that matches would resume on 12 June, but there is now an expectation this will be pushed back until at least the end of the month if not later. Germany’s Bundesliga league saw action behind closed doors at the weekend for the first time since the lockdown, while South Korea’s top flight has also resumed.
Alongside the draft text of a proposed trade treaty with the EU, No 10 has also published this afternoon an open letter (pdf) from David Frost, the PM’s chief Europe adviser, to Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator. In the four-page letter, which is written in a tone of polite indignation (feigned or genuine, it’s hard to tell), Frost sets out in detail why the UK government thinks the EU’s demands are unreasonable. He says:
The number of confirmed cases of Covid-19 in the prison estate continues to rise, daily figures from the Ministry of Justice show.
As at 5pm on Monday, 422 prisoners had tested positive for the coronavirus across 74 prisons, a 3% increase in 24 hours, while there were 542 infected prison staff across 72 prisons, an increase of just 0.4% in the same period.
There are around 80,300 prisoners in England and Wales across 117 prisons, while around 33,000 staff work in the public sector prisons.
At least 21 prisoners are known to have contracted Covid-19 and died, as well as nine prison staff, including one Pecs (prison escort and custody services) worker.
The Duke of Cambridge has highlighted the strain of the Covid-19 pandemic on the mental health of frontline workers looking after others, urging them: “Take care of yourself too.”
In a video message, Prince William thanked those working in the emergency services, hospitals or care homes, calling on them to seek support if their mental wellbeing is suffering.
“When you spend all day taking care of others it is easy to forget that you need to take care of yourself too,” he said. “But it’s OK to say when you’re not feeling OK. There is support available to you, if and when you need it.”
The message is part of the recently launched Our Frontline initiative, supported by his Royal Foundation, which provides one-to-one support and online resources for a range of workers whose psychological wellbeing may be under pressure.
In the video, posted on Our Frontline Twitter account, William said: “I want to say a huge thank you from myself and Catherine for all that you are doing to keep everyone safe. You and your families are making huge sacrifices, and we want you to know that the whole country is enormously proud of you.
The duke, who was a pilot with the East Anglian Air Ambulance and has spoken in the past about the mental pressures that came with the job, added: “From my time with the air ambulance, I know all too well how determined frontline workers are to put a brave face on and keep going.”
In a 2018 interview, William said the experience of attending traumatic emergencies involving children and having his own children “tipped me over the edge”, but speaking to his crew helped him cope with the “enormous sadness” he had witnessed.
The duke and duchess have pledged to make the mental health of frontline workers their “top priority” in the months ahead. Mind, Samaritans, Shout - a text messaging helpline supporting people in crisis - Hospice UK and the Royal Foundation launched Our Frontline a few weeks ago, with William and Kate’s charitable body helping to raise awareness.
In the Lords economic affairs committee Sunak says debt will obviously be higher after the coronavirus crisis. But he says he has not made a decision yet as to what a sustainable debt level would be.
At the Lords economic affairs committee Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, has just been engaged in a minor spat with Lord Forsyth, the committee chair, about social care. Forsyth said there was a consensus about adult social care needing much higher funding. Sunak affected surprise, and said that if there was a consensus, he would like to hear about it (implying that he thought no such consensus existed). Forsyth said that his committee published a report last summer saying the sector needed another £15bn. The report said the money should come from general taxation, but it did not make specific recommendations as to which taxes should go up. Sunak said he thought the plans would require income tax rising by either 2p or 3p in the pound. He implied that he thought it would be hard to get consensus support for tax increases on that scale.At the Lords economic affairs committee Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, has just been engaged in a minor spat with Lord Forsyth, the committee chair, about social care. Forsyth said there was a consensus about adult social care needing much higher funding. Sunak affected surprise, and said that if there was a consensus, he would like to hear about it (implying that he thought no such consensus existed). Forsyth said that his committee published a report last summer saying the sector needed another £15bn. The report said the money should come from general taxation, but it did not make specific recommendations as to which taxes should go up. Sunak said he thought the plans would require income tax rising by either 2p or 3p in the pound. He implied that he thought it would be hard to get consensus support for tax increases on that scale.
David Henig, a former civil servant and trade specialist who now heads the UK Trade Policy Project for the European Centre for International Political Economy, has been looking at the UK government’s draft text for a proposed trade deal with the EU. He has posted a detailed Twitter thread on it starting here.David Henig, a former civil servant and trade specialist who now heads the UK Trade Policy Project for the European Centre for International Political Economy, has been looking at the UK government’s draft text for a proposed trade deal with the EU. He has posted a detailed Twitter thread on it starting here.
And here are his conclusions.And here are his conclusions.
The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine has published some new research today suggesting the people with chronic medical conditions, like obesity, hypertension and lung disease, have been disproportionately likely to reduce the amount of exercise they take during the lockdown. Dr Nina Rogers, the lead author of the study, said:The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine has published some new research today suggesting the people with chronic medical conditions, like obesity, hypertension and lung disease, have been disproportionately likely to reduce the amount of exercise they take during the lockdown. Dr Nina Rogers, the lead author of the study, said:
Harriet Harman, the chair of parliament’s joint committee on human rights (JCHR), has called for MPs to be allowed to vote on a data protection bill safeguarding widespread use of the government’s contact-tracing app.
The Labour MP and her committee have produced what is effectively a private member’s bill – a proposed law submitted by a backbencher – aimed at improving privacy standards and boosting public confidence in the novel system.
In a briefing on Wednesday, Harman said she had sent the digital contact tracing (data protection) bill to the health secretary, Matt Hancock, and to Jacob Rees-Mogg, leader of the Commons.
Specific legislation, she urged, is required rather than the existing “mishmash” of standards involving the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), case law, the European convention on human rights and the Data Protection Act because the contact-tracing app is more ambitious than anything previously envisaged.
The JCHR bill would prevent data being used for other purposes, stop anybody not authorised gaining access to it, delete the data after the pandemic and establish a contact-tracing human rights commissioner.
Harman said she would personally download the app, which is already being piloted on the Isle of Wight, but her committee’s view was that it should not go ahead without new privacy protections.
Those protections should apply whether or not the government continued with its existing centralised model or whether it eventually opted for the type of “decentralised” app being used more widely on the continent.
Only Australia, she had acknowledged, has so far passed data protection legislation specifically applying to a contact-tracing app. “I have asked Jacob Rees-Mogg to make time in parliament to bring [the bill] forward,“ Harman said. “If not they should allow parliament to say whether [should have a vote on it.]”
Asked whether safeguards should be relaxed during an emergency, Harman said it was a matter of balancing the right to life with privacy protections.
Back in the Lords economic affairs committee, asked if he agrees that promoting growth should take precedence over addressing debt after the crisis is over, Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, says that of course he wants to promote growth.
Welcome news for Italian food lovers as Pizza Express becomes the latest restaurant chain to cautiously reopen restaurants to offer home delivery across the capital.
The firm will start delivering from 13 sites in London over the next 10 days, offering a limited menu to ensure staff can work safely in kitchens and prep areas.
It follows an earlier announcement from Wagamama, which is expanding delivery across the nation, and comes in the wake of KFC, McDonald’s, Greggs and Subway all making similar plans or starting trading again after shutting due to the Covid-19
Zoe Bowley, the managing director of Pizza Express in the UK and Ireland, said the chain would offer an edited menu from restaurants in “London villages”, including Notting Hill, Balham and Fulham, where demand is highest.
Writing in industry newsletter Propel, she said: “We will do this to test and learn, and then it will enable us to programme the roll-out and ultimately pave the way for dine in the future.”
Restaurants and bars have been allowed to remain open for takeaways and deliveries under government rules but many larger chains chose to shut completely, to protect staff from travelling to work.
Bowley added in the piece: “There has been huge rigour around all the right safety protocols so our teams feel comfortable, and then we can really demonstrate to customers how we are looking after the teams and ensure they trust the quality of the pizza they receive.”
Meanwhile, service station business Moto said it will reopen seven Costa drive-throughs and have 27 Burger Kings open for takeaway to the public by Thursday.
Michael Russell, the Scottish government’s constitution secretary, has issued this statement following the publication of the UK government’s draft text of a proposed free trade treaty with the EU. (See 3.08pm.) He said:
In the Lords committee Lord Forsyth, the former Conservative cabinet minister who chairs the committee, says the reproduction number, R, is lower in London. So, given that London is the motor of the economy, would it make sense to lift the lockdown in London first?
Sunak says his understanding is that that is not what the scientists are advising at the moment.
Q: Why won’t you tell employers what percentage of the furlough scheme they will have to pay from August? And why didn’t you take a sectoral approach?
Sunak says the change will come into effect in August. He says he will publish his plans by the end of this month. That will give employers ample time to prepare, he says.
And he says he looked at adopting a sectoral approach to the furlough scheme. But he decided it would be very difficult to enforce, particularly taking into account supply chains. So he went for a wider, more generous approach, he says.
At the Lords committee hearing Sunak said that the longer the recession went on, the more likely there was to be “scarring” (ie, people suffering a permanent to their wages or income).
In the Lords committee Sunak says it is not obvious that there will be an immediate bounce back. Asked about the likely shape of the recovery, he said:
Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, has just started giving evidence to the Lords economic affairs committee.
He said that by the end of the year he expected unemployment to be in double figures.
He also said Britain was facing “a severe recession the likes of which we haven’t seen”. He told the peers:
The UK has published its terms for a free trade agreement with the European Union as it looks to ramp up pressure on Brussels to back down over its demands. Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, told MPs in response to an urgent question earlier that the government had decided to make public the UK’s draft legal texts, with a 291-page draft comprehensive free trade agreement among the 12 documents to be published this afternoon.
The draft treaty is here (pdf). And the rest of the documents being published today (mostly related draft treaty agreements) are here.