argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Navendu Prabhat Mishra (Labour, Centre-left): We are at a crossroads in this crisis and the Government, rather than knowing which way to turn, are instead caught in the headlights. This Government have had seven months to get their test and trace system in place, but, tragically for the almost 50,000 people who have lost their lives already since this pandemic started, it has failed. There can be no excuse when our European partners have had an effective system in place since May This is a deeply worrying period for my Stockport constituents, given that Greater Manchester and the north-west are witnessing some of the highest infection rates in the country, and we are now in the Government’s tier 2 category. Indeed, in the borough of Stockport alone, there are now more than 4,000 cases of coronavirus, and it is being reported that the Government will today convene a gold command meeting where Greater Manchester may be moved into tier 3—the highest category Despite this, the Government are offering little beyond lockdown measures to stop the spread of this deadly disease. The Mayor of Greater Manchester has been calling for proper funding for test and trace for months, and only today the leaders of all 10 councils in Greater Manchester and the Mayor, Andy Burnham, released a statement in response to the new restrictions. In it, they call for testing "to enable targeting of known or emerging points of transmission." They also raise valid concerns about this Government’s attempt to bounce Greater Manchester into the higher risk tier 3 category.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Navendu Prabhat Mishra (Labour, Centre-left): I understand the points the hon. Lady is making, but I think contact tracing in Greater Manchester and places with very high rates of infection has not worked as well as it should have. I am pleased to hear that in her constituency it is working well, but I think the Government need to come forward with a proper package to support jobs in the hospitality sector if they are going to force regions like the Liverpool city region or Greater Manchester into tier 3 The Government are dangling the carrot of local control of test and trace. However, this should be on offer for all areas, and is more likely to be effective in areas that are in tier 1 and tier 2. If this Government pursue their current strategy, they will leave large parts of the north of England trapped in tier 3 for much of the winter. Given that cases are forecast to rise sharply as this Government lose control and refuse to provide the substantial economic support that tier 3 areas will need, I fully support the call by a number of local authority leaders in Greater Manchester for a national circuit break. This would also create the conditions for a reset of the test and trace service into a more locally controlled option, which will hopefully drive cases down to a lower level and be more likely to succeed The only way to defeat the virus is for national and local government to work hand in hand, upskill the local test and trace system, delegate sufficient powers and provide the financial support that is so desperately required after 10 years of austerity and having stumped up millions during the first phase of this pandemic. But instead of addressing the failures of a privatised and centralised contact tracing model, this Government choose to keep pouring hundreds of millions of pounds into the likes of Serco to lead the effort on tracking and tracing. This is despite the recent poll by Survation revealing that 74% of the public wanted to see local public health teams, rather than profit-making companies, leading on this. Our European partners have had systems in place since May, yet almost six months later this Government are rushing to hand the nearest contract to big business with no track record of delivery or success It is clear is that we cannot have more of the same from this Government such as the shambles of being informed by a Health Minister that a new testing centre was being opened for my constituents on a University of Greenwich campus 240 miles away in Kent. I have already made it clear to the House that I am willing to accept that the letter was an error, but it further exposes the Government’s complete mishandling of this crisis. In the absence of any effective form of test and trace, frontline staff, including all workers in hospitals, schools and local authorities, must be provided with access to adequate personal protective equipment.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Alison McGovern (Labour, Centre-left): I am glad to be called in this debate, so thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I will make one point before speaking about tracking and tracing in the Wirral It is disappointing to listen to Conservative Members criticising a political party’s position or what its briefings might have been earlier this week or last week, before SAGE’s minutes and reports were published on the next steps that are needed. I would far rather that the Labour party had to correct its press releases than that we fail to save lives that we otherwise could. I am sorry that Conservative Members take a different view My hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood) spoke about the need for improved, larger public health teams, particularly in the Wirral. I am thankful for Julie Webster and Elspeth Anwar, our director and deputy director of public health in the Wirral, who have been absolutely first-class public servants. They have explained to me that, although they now have much more data about the outbreak in the Wirral and the rest of Merseyside, we do not have enough analysis That is to say that we cannot easily understand the story the data is telling us, because we do not have enough specialists working on this, particularly in the Wirral. I have learned through three years on the Treasury Committee and wading through reams of economic data that it is not actually about the figures in front of you; it is about understanding the story that the data is telling you and acting accordingly. It is not numbers for the sake of numbers; it is the instructions those numbers give In an outbreak like this, we need a hypothesis about the methods of transmission so that we are able to test it against the data. I say to the Minister that we not only need to help local authorities with the data; we also need analytical capacity in every town hall in Britain, because this virus travels through local areas in different ways. In London, many people are able to work from home. In a manufacturing environment, as we have in the Wirral, that just is not possible. People cannot make cars and airplanes from their front room The virus travels differently in places where public transport is more frequently used. Some places use buses rather than trains, and they are a different environment. That is why I say again to the Minister: give us data analysts in every town hall in Britain, so we can understand how this virus is travelling through our country and put a stop to it. If we had proper analysis and local understanding, we would have half a chance of finding out how this virus works.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Catherine McKinnell (Labour, Centre-left): I agree with everything my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern) said NHS Test and Trace is not working. Billions of pounds have been poured into a system that has sidelined existing local expertise in primary care, public health and science. The resulting system is labelled NHS Test and Trace, but it has hardly anything to do with the NHS. Stop denigrating the NHS by associating it with this failing system We are stuck in this world of uncertainty, with a rising infection rate and the virus out of control, and we are without the ability to properly track it, as my hon. Friend has just described. It is like "Groundhog Day". Until we have a vaccine, we will not get out of this without a functioning track and trace system We are the fifth richest economy in the world, and we have one of the best healthcare systems. We have leading science research universities, yet we have spent all this money contracting out the system to Serco. Now, on top of that, we are spending millions of pounds bringing in private contractors to try to sort out the mess. It costs more in one week than we pay an experienced nurse in a year. It is a disgrace, and it feels like a wasted opportunity to build on the existing expertise and experience to strengthen the local systems in primary care and local authorities. Doing that now is the only way out of this nightmare scenario The outbreaks we have seen in the universities in Newcastle, for example, were not identified by the national system—it seems incapable of doing that at present. The outbreaks were identified based on local intelligence and local knowledge, and by piecing the pieces together. We know that co-operation between local health services and authorities is the way to control infectious diseases. GPs, NHS and public health laboratories, and local public health officers all play a key role. Winter is approaching and GPs will be the people who can see the overlap in covid symptoms such as fever and a dry cough, and the classic flu symptoms of fatigue, sore throat and headaches. We need that integrated public health expertise to truly make this testing and tracking system work. We have 1,200 primary care networks in England. They will be best placed not only to run test, track and trace, but to deliver the vaccine when we finally have it—we will be ready for it.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Catherine McKinnell (Labour, Centre-left): Absolutely, spend the billions of pounds that we have wasted—spend it on bumping up the capacity and ability of our local GPs and health services, which can do a better job. I wish to say a word about asymptomatic carriers. Research published by University College London last week found that 86% of those sampled who had tested positive for covid-19 between April and July had had no symptoms—that includes cough, fever or loss of taste and smell. So many people who are asymptomatic test positive, as we have seen at Northumbria University, and that is hugely concerning. It shows that we need a much more robust and expanded testing strategy to control the virus What are the Government doing to ensure that we can capture these silent spreaders? Is the system anywhere close to having the capacity to address this, given that we cannot even test those who have symptoms and have been instructed to take a test? The Government wasted the time we spent in national lockdown and failed to get the apparatus of proper track and trace system in place once those restrictions were finally relaxed. We are now living with the consequences of that decision. As we now appear to be entering another era of harsher restrictions across much of the country, the Government owe it to the people who continue to endure hardship, uncertainty, loneliness and bereavement not to waste this time again.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Naseem Akhtar Shah (Labour, Centre-left): May I start by placing on the record my thanks to my local director of public health, Sarah Muckle, and her team for all their hard work during this pandemic? Labour has been calling on the Government to learn the lessons, help curb a rise in infections and save lives. The Government continue to use this phrase "NHS track and trace system", which is more widely and truthfully known by the British public as, "Huge amounts of cash going to big private companies"—companies with links to the Tory party, and companies with truly abysmal track and trace records and poor results: in short, Serco and Sitel. The Government are doing this instead of funding local contact tracing and addressing the failures of a privatised and centralised contact tracing model Bradford, which contains my constituency, consistently seems to perform bottom on tracking and tracing the contacts of those who test positive for covid-19. The average percentage of contacts reached in Bradford over the last nine-week data period was 48.1%, but some weeks the figure has been lower than 40%. That is half the Government’s target. The rising infection rates are the direct result of a broken track and trace system, the Government’s inability to use straightforward communication and sheer incompetence on the part of this Government Here are some examples to illustrate how poor the Government’s communications have been. Two days ago, the Secretary of State told me that Bradford will be in the high tier of restrictions. Later that same day, in the press conference, the chief medical officer praised Bradford for our response to the situation. Then yesterday, we heard that the Government had started discussions to place Bradford in the highest tier of restrictions. Today, there is a pre-paid, pre-booked full-page Government advertisement in the Telegraph and Argus, Bradford’s local paper, saying that Bradford is in the medium tier of restrictions. So which one is it? Are we in the medium, high or higher tier? Hold on—there’s more. On a Zoom call two days ago, I asked the Secretary of State what his Department was doing to address the issue of low numbers of people being tracked and traced in Bradford. Two days later, I still have no response, and yet the Secretary of State expects Members to be on a call with 20 minutes’ notice, and that is if they are lucky enough to get the email and not be on a train travelling down here The privatised track and trace programme is not working. My constituents deserve better. We need to get ahead of this virus. I will come to this Chamber time and again to highlight the Government’s incompetence and hold them to account for the sake of my constituents, because my constituents deserve better.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Matthew Toby Perkins (Labour, Centre-left): I spent an early part of my career in the sales industry, selling in the IT sector. I just wish that at some point I had come across a customer with as much money as this Government, and one so easily impressed and willing to give money to suppliers and then to defend them when they let them down. I never came across a customer nearly as naive as this Government Occasionally, a story seems to demonstrate a much wider point. So it was today with the scoop revealed by Ed Conway of Sky News that the Government are paying £7,360 per day to the management consultants at Boston Consulting Group, who are in charge of test and trace. That is the equivalent of a £1.5 million salary to preside over this shambolic system that is letting down all the people in my constituency and so many others. We will not find dedicated public servants being paid £7,500 a day or £1.5 million a year, but we will find a basic competence, a knowledge of their area and a desire to ensure that systems work before they are implemented. That is what we need right now in our system It is telling that, in a debate of this importance, with every Back-Bench Member of Parliament invited to contribute, just three Conservative MPs wanted to put their name on the list and say, "I will go in and speak up for the Government, because I think they are doing a good job." That is because people in their constituencies know what is happening, and Conservative Members do not want it to be on their record that they were the ones speaking up for the Government, so they leave it to us to come here and expose the reality. That is what is happening. There are 365 Tory MPs—where are they? They are off in their offices hiding, while people in my constituency are being let down. [Interruption.] I accept that three have turned up, and I thank them for that, but I am talking about the rest of them We all remember when Leicester first went into lockdown and everyone said, "Oh my God! The rate in Leicester is appalling—those poor people." The infection rate was less than 100 per 100,000 then.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Naseem Akhtar Shah (Labour, Centre-left): Does my hon. Friend share my worry that the proportion of people being reached by Test and Trace has decreased over the last three weeks and is now at a level similar to the one seen in the first week of the programme?
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Matthew Toby Perkins (Labour, Centre-left): Yes, I do, and I had an experience of that recently. Leicester had a rate of 100 per 100,000 when it went into lockdown. In Chesterfield, we have a rate of 143 per 100,000, and we are still in tier 1. The scale of how bad this must be before the Government are shocked is changing all the time I was recently in self-isolation because a friend told me that he had been diagnosed with coronavirus four days before Test and Trace got in touch with me. The date that Test and Trace had was nine days after I came out of self-isolation. The whole system is not working, and when you experience it yourself, you can see why this failure is happening.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Bethan Winter (Labour, Centre-left): The purpose of test, track and trace is to save lives. Despite the Prime Minister’s promise of a "world-beating" system, the system that we have is shambolic. Health contracts worth £830 million have been handed to private companies using public money to run ineffective systems, instead of investing in our public services. In Wales, we have established a successful public sector "test, trace, protect" system, and recent figures show that 96% of close contacts have been reached—much higher than the Serco private sector system. Currently, however, testing in Wales is still partly dependent on the UK Government’s privately run and centrally managed testing system, which has caused confusion and placed people at risk I will illustrate the point with my experience in Cynon Valley, which has one of the privately run centres. It is a case study in how not to do things. On 17 September, because of a worrying increase in covid cases in my constituency, serious local restrictions were placed on us that meant that people could not travel in or out of the local authority area without a reasonable excuse. A Serco covid-19 testing site was established in the village of Abercynon, where it became apparent that operational failures were compromising the new restrictions brought in for the area. There was a shortage of testing kits, which resulted in the site being closed for several hours, and there were problems with the administration of the testing regime I was astounded to find that the centrally administered, privately run system was allocating appointments that required people to travel hundreds of miles across the UK, including families with children and vulnerable people. That was unacceptable and extremely dangerous to those coming into the high-incidence area, as well as to the local population in my constituency. I wrote to the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on that day in September with a series of questions, but I have yet to receive a response. That is totally unacceptable Thank goodness that in Wales we have a measure of independence from this Tory Government, and that we were able to act to address the problems through a system co-ordinated by a proactive local authority health board and the Welsh Government. As the public are asked to make sacrifices to reduce the transmission of covid-19, it is imperative for the Government to keep their side of the bargain and get the test, track and trace system right. Most importantly, I know from experience that local decision making in action is best, as are publicly owned services. Let us learn the lessons of Abercynon, invest in our public services and not let private profit and greed override the health needs in our communities.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Katharine Helen Brooks-Osborne (Labour, Centre-left): Let us be clear from the start: the test, trace and isolate chaos that we are currently facing has been caused by outsourced companies running what should be public services for their own private profit. The current restrictions were never inevitable; they became inevitable as a result of this Government’s failure to get a properly functioning test, trace and isolate system in place. The system has been given to private companies with no qualifications for this work, overseen by business executives with no experience in public health. Just days before local restrictions came into place in the north-east, my Jarrow constituents were asking me to find out what has happened with the "shambles", as they put it, that is the covid testing system. One constituent, Tracy, told me how a family member did a 110-mile round trip from Gateshead to Hawick in Scotland for a test. This was while there were appointments in Newcastle just a few miles along the road, but the centre had IT problems and the QR code was not being generated. She was rightly furious that her family member, while displaying symptoms, had to drive this distance. My Jarrow constituents are right: it is an utter shambles This Government’s approach to contact tracing is not just shambolic—it is dangerous. The evidence shows that contact tracing works much better on a local level. Both the South Tyneside and Gateshead local authorities covering my constituency have been constantly telling the Government this, but they are just not listening. I pay tribute to Alice Wiseman and Tom Hall, the directors of public health for those authorities, and their teams, for their dedication and hard work From Oldham to Peterborough, from Manchester to Cumbria, and across Wales, we have seen how local councils bring back much higher contact rates and can curb the spread of infection far more than the outsourced model that the Government keep throwing money away on. The Government know it is not working, yet the same old Tory ideological commitment to outsourcing continues. According to the Government’s own data, local health protection teams are reaching 97% of contacts and asking them to self-isolate, while, in contrast, outsourced cases handled online or by call centres return 62.4% contact rates. The most striking thing is that the Government have had plenty of opportunity throughout the summer to address the failures of a privatised and centralised contact tracing model, yet they have chosen to keep pouring money into the likes of Serco to lead the effort on tracking and tracing.
Local Contact Tracing — House of Commons, 2020-10-14
Topic: Health
Katharine Helen Brooks-Osborne (Labour, Centre-left): No, I do not. The Government can put this right by putting more money in, of course As my hon. Friends the Members for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) and for Bradford West (Naz Shah), among others, have said, we have to stop calling it "NHS Track and Trace", as it clearly is not. It has failed, it is wasteful, it is throwing taxpayers’ money down the drain, and the people of this country deserve better. In fact, only this afternoon, as already highlighted by my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr Perkins), I heard that the Government paid Boston Consulting Group about £10 million for a team of 40 consultants to do four months’ work on this failed testing system between the end of April and late August. Yet our local public services, hollowed out by 10 years of austerity, are being left with no support to pick up the pieces of a failed system Our local authorities in the north-east were crucial in the frontline against the first wave of this virus. That is why the Government must recognise their value by extending additional funding for contact tracing available in tier 3 areas to all parts of the country. The Government must ensure that local authorities and public health teams receive the resources and powers that they need.