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UK coronavirus news: minister under fire after suggesting media questions to PM about Covid rule details unfair
UK coronavirus news: Johnson faces Starmer at PMQs amid pressure from MPs over Covid emergency powers
(32 minutes later)
Live updates: prime minister under pressure from MPs ahead of debate on extending emergency powers in the Coronavirus Act
Live updates: prime minister under pressure from MPs ahead of debate on extending emergency powers in the Coronavirus Act
Starmer says the PM described local measures as a “whack-a-mole strategy’. But that implies the mole goes down. In these areas, the virus has not gone away. What is the plan for getting them out of restrictions?
Johnson says nobody wants to see these measures. But you have to take strong action. He says the illness seems to be more localised now than it was in the spring.
Sir Keir Starmer says over 16m people - one in four - are living under restrictions in England. But only one area, Luton, has come out of local restrictions. Why?
Johnson says Starmer is right. There is “a serious and growing problem with the resurgence of the virus”. In Luton local people pulled together. That is the way forward for the entire country.
Jason McCartney (Con) asks if the PM will support the events industry.
Boris Johnson says he would like to have a situation where people can be tested before events.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, starts with a statement.
He says the way in which the government has used its powers to make secondary legislation during the crisis has been “totally unsatisfactory”.
He says regulations have come into force with very little notice. That is “totally unsatisfactory”, he says.
He says he will give “very sympathetic” consideration to applications for urgent questions on these matters.
MPs should get the chance to vote on amendable motions on regulations, he says.
But, turning to tonight’s debate, he says only 90 minutes has been set aside for it.
He cannot give it extra time, he says.
He says when he became Speaker he said he would take decisions based on advice.
He says tonight’s debate is meant to be a simple yes/no vote on renewing the Coronavirus Act.
He says any amendments might create uncertainty. So he will not allow amendments, he said.
But he says he hopes the government will resolve this issue and stop treating parliament with contempt.
From my colleague Jessica Elgot
PMQs is about to start.
The list of MPs down to ask a question is here.
The Lib Dems have said they will vote against renewing the Coronavirus Act tonight. In a statement the party leader, Sir Ed Davey, said:
Britain’s car industry risks losing out even if there is a post-Brexit trade deal with the EU, according to a report by the BBC’s economics editor, Faisal Islam. This means car parts from Japan and Turkey used in the UK will not be treated as British, so some exports may see higher tariffs, the BBC reports.
Lucy Powell, a shadow business minister, said:
Five staff members and one patient have tested positive with Covid-19 at the cardiac unit of Belfast’s Royal Victoria hospital.
The Belfast trust, which runs hospitals in the city, confirmed the outbreak today.
It comes as the number of positive tests for coronavirus in Northern Ireland is confirmed as 320 - the highest daily total since current test systems were put in place in the region.
There are 550 people in NHS beds in Wales for Covid-related illnesses – up by 60% on seven days ago. The number of patients being treated in critical care beds has risen from 16 to 34 in the last week.
The Welsh health minister, Vaughan Gething, said there was more “scepticism” about Covid-19, partly being fuelled by conspiracy theories.
Gething said the public was “thirsty for action” in March because of a “rising tide in deaths” in other parts of the world. There was more “complacency” now, he told the Senedd’s health, social care and sport committee.
The Scottish government has announced a consultation on whether to make permanent the arrangements that have made it easier for women to have an early abortion at home during the pandemic.
The Scottish government has announced a consultation on whether to make permanent the arrangements that have made it easier for women to have an early abortion at home during the pandemic.
Since March, women have been able to take both pills required for an early medical abortion at home, where it is considered clinically appropriate.
Since March, women have been able to take both pills required for an early medical abortion at home, where it is considered clinically appropriate.
The current arrangements will remain in place as long as the virus remains a risk, but consultation has now started to gather views, including from women who have had the treatment, on making the current arrangements permanent.
The current arrangements will remain in place as long as the virus remains a risk, but consultation has now started to gather views, including from women who have had the treatment, on making the current arrangements permanent.
Scotland’s public health minister Joe FitzPatrick said:
Scotland’s public health minister, Joe FitzPatrick, said:
On this morning’s BBC Victoria Derbyshire show the Conservative backbencher Peter Bone said that, if the government did not agree to give MPs prior votes on coronavirus regulations, he would vote against the entire Coronavirus Act tonight. The act, which gives ministers a very wide range of emergency powers, has to be renewed every six months and if the government were to lose the main vote tonight (which is most unlikely - Labour is not expected to vote against) the powers would lapse.
On this morning’s BBC Victoria Derbyshire show the Conservative backbencher Peter Bone said that, if the government did not agree to give MPs prior votes on coronavirus regulations, he would vote against the entire Coronavirus Act tonight. The act, which gives ministers a very wide range of emergency powers, has to be renewed every six months and if the government were to lose the main vote tonight (which is most unlikely - Labour is not expected to vote against) the powers would lapse.
Bone said he did not think it would matter if the act became redundant. He explained:
Bone said he did not think it would matter if the act became redundant. He explained:
Here is Sky’s Sam Coates on the standoff between No 10 and Tory backbenchers over the powers parliament has to scrutinise coronavirus regulations. (See 9.23am.)
Here is Sky’s Sam Coates on the standoff between No 10 and Tory backbenchers over the powers parliament has to scrutinise coronavirus regulations. (See 9.23am.)
A Whitehall brainstorming session prompted by Priti Patel led to the idea being floated of sending asylum seekers to a volcanic island in the South Atlantic, my colleagues Peter Walker and Jessica Murray report.
A Whitehall brainstorming session prompted by Priti Patel led to the idea being floated of sending asylum seekers to a volcanic island in the South Atlantic, my colleagues Peter Walker and Jessica Murray report.
An initial review of the parliamentary art collection has found 232 items with links to the transatlantic slave trade, the House of Commons has said. Of those pieces, 189 depict 24 people who had ties to the slave trade and 40 pieces depict 14 people who were abolitionists.
There are more than 9,500 works of art in the collection and a review is under way, prompted by concerns raised by the Black Lives Matter movement.
Hywel Williams, the Plaid Cymru MP who chairs the Speaker’s advisory committee on works of art, said:
There are details of the 232 items here (pdf).
The fishing industry has warned the government not to sell it out in Brexit talks after it emerged that the UK had offered a three-year transition deal for the sector to help get a trade deal over the line by December.
“The fear right from the beginning has has been that we would again be sold out as we were in the 1970s,” said Barrie Deas, head of the National Federation of Fishermen’s Organisations said at briefing this morning.
But he warned the government not to sell them out.
But he said “all the signals” were the government would deliver.
He believed that a transition period was “one of the moving parts” of the negotiations and the industry could be content if it was a “step-wise movement towards the quota system” the industry is seeking.
Alok Sharma is (quite rightly) being widely criticised by journalists for suggesting that it is unfair for broadcasters to ask ministers to explain details of coronavirus restrictions. (See 10.01am.) Here are some of the comments he’s attracting on Twitter.
From Laura Kuenssberg, the BBC’s political editor
From Jason Groves, the Daily Mail’s political editor
From Nick Robinson, the Today presenter
From the Daily Mirror’s Dan Bloom
From Bloomberg’s Emily Ashton
From LBC’s Theo Usherwood
From openDemocracy’s Caroline Molloy
The Evening Standard’s Sophia Sleigh says Alok Sharma used the “gotcha” line (see 10.01am) in three separate interviews this morning.
Tom Newton Dunn from Times Radio thinks it was scripted.
Alok Sharma, the business secretary, has suggested that it is wrong for journalists to ask ministers if they know they detail of lockdown restrictions. Speaking on Radio 4’s Today programme this morning he said:
Sharma was talking in the context of the PM’s failure to be able to explain the new lockdown restrictions imposed on the north-east of England in a Q&A yesterday. A few hours before Boris Johnson fluffed the question, an education minister, Gillian Keegan, failed to answer the same question on the Today programme.
As soon as Sharma made his “quiz show” jibe, the Today presenter Martha Kearney asked if he was seriously arguing that asking ministers to explain the coronavirus rules was as trivial as a quiz question. At that point Sharma backed down a bit, replying:
Labour said Sharma was trying to excuse incompetence. Alex Norris, a shadow health minister, said:
Temporary restrictions to services are to be put in place at the Royal Glamorgan hospital in Llantrisant, south Wales, after 82 cases of coronavirus were identified there, PA Media reports.
The restrictions, which come into force at 2pm today, include suspending planned surgery with the exception of a small number of urgent cancer cases that have been clinically prioritised.
There are currently 82 case of coronavirus identified at the hospital, which is in Rhondda Cynon Taf - one of the areas of Wales subjected to local lockdown restrictions.
Last week, Cwm Taf Morgannwg University health board said 34 cases of Covid-19 had been recorded across two wards at the Royal Glamorgan hospital, linked mainly to transmission within the site.
In a statement on Wednesday, the health board said that despite teams working to manage the outbreak, “additional cases linked to transmission within the hospital” had been confirmed in recent days.
In his Today interview Steve Baker gave a clue as to the possible basis of a deal between ministers and backbenchers over the Commons getting more say over Covid rules (see 9.23am) when he stressed three principles. He said:
Yesterday Sir Bernard Jenkin, the chair of the Commons liaison committee, offered his own proposal for a possible compromise. In a letter to the PM he said:
It is worth pointing out that the rebel Tories are not demanding that every single new coronavirus regulation has to be voted on by MPs before it comes into law. Here is the amendment tabled by Sir Graham Brady, saying the Coronavirus Act power should be renewed:
Good morning. Brexit was supposed to be about parliament “taking back control” but one of the extraordinary ironies of 2020 is that Britain’s departure from the European Union has coincided with the government implementing the most draconian restrictions on ordinary life seen in peacetime - mostly with MPs having no say over the process at all. The key lockdown measures have become law as regulations passed under emergency powers, Because of the way such secondary legislation is scrutinised, MPs have not had the chance to vote before the laws take effect, the few votes that have taken place have been retrospective (after the laws are already in place) and mostly the regulations have not been subject to votes or debates at all.
Now many MPs have had enough. There will be a debate tonight on extending the powers in the Coronavirus Act and many amendments have been tabled saying MPs should have a greater say. The most important has been tabled by Sir Graham Brady, the chair of the Conservative backbench 1922 Committee, and it has got the support of dozens of Tories. It is likely that the amendments won’t be put to a vote for procedural reasons and ministers know that, if they don’t resolve this issue now, at some point soon the rebels will line up with the opposition to defeat them over this and so talks will take place this morning on a possible compromise.
In an interview on the Today programme this morning Steve Baker, the Tory former minister and a leading rebel on this issue, said that
Baker said 247 pieces of delegated legislation had been introduced to implement coronavirus restrictions. He said it was not being properly scrutinised, and members of the public could not keep up with it. “The rule of law is based on ideas like certainty, predictability, clarity and stability and I think we’ve seen that they are going out of the window with this virus,” he said. He went on:
We’ll hear a lot more on this as the day goes on. Here is the agenda.
9am: Boris Johnson chairs cabinet.
10.15am: Thérèse Coffey, the work and pensions secretary, gives evidence to the work and pensions committee about coronavirus and benefits.
12pm: Johnson faces Sir Keir Starmer at PMQs.
12.15pm: The Scottish government is due to hold its daily coronavirus briefing.
12.30pm: Oliver Dowden, the culture secretary, answers an urgent question on government support for professional and amateur sport.
2.30pm: Anne Longfield, the children’s commissioner for England, gives evidence to the Commons women and equalities committee about the impact of coronavirus on children’s education.
5pm: Johnson holds a press conference with Prof Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical adviser, and Sir Patrick Vallance, its chief scientific adviser.
Later, after 7pm, there will be the 90-minute debate on renewing the powers in the Coronavirus Act. The rebel amendment is not expected to be called, and it is possible that ministers and rebels may agree a compromise deal before the debate starts, but the debate will still give MPs a chance to speak out on this issue.
Politics Live has been doubling up as the UK coronavirus live blog for some time and, given the way the Covid crisis eclipses everything, this will continue for the foreseeable future. But we will be covering non-Covid political stories too, and where they seem more important and interesting, they will take precedence.
Here is our global coronavirus 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.
