argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Public Health Restrictions: Government Economic Support — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Kevan David Jones (Labour, Centre-left): The Prime Minister has been clear that the Government’s response to the covid crisis will follow the science. Last night, on a conference call with Professor Stephen Powys, the medical director for England, the hon. Member for Windsor (Adam Afriyie) and my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) asked about the science behind the 10 pm curfew on pubs and restaurants. Professor Powys said that there was no specific advice and in his words it was a "policy decision". Given that thousands of jobs and businesses are at risk in tier 2 areas such as the north-east, can the Minister tell us what the logic is behind this policy decision?
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Angela Eagle (Labour, Centre-left): Given that Liverpool city region, which includes my constituency of Wallasey, was placed in tier 3 yesterday, could the Secretary of State outline whether there are plans to reopen or revive the Nightingale hospitals to serve that region? I do not mean the hospital in Manchester.
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Daniel Joseph Carden (Labour, Centre-left): Yesterday, in his call with Merseyside MPs, the Health Secretary was asked about a circuit breaker lockdown and he did not say that SAGE had recommended that three weeks ago. Is that the case? Will he now publish the full scientific evidence for a circuit breaker lockdown?
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Deborah Angela Elspeth Marie Abrahams (Labour, Centre-left): I cannot let the right hon. Gentleman get away with that. In 2016, Operation Cygnus was very clear about what needed to happen. It was a question not of if there was going to be a pandemic; it was when. The Government failed to introduce all the recommendations from that exercise. I will not let them get away with this.
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Maria Eagle (Labour, Centre-left): The coronavirus situation on Merseyside is such that I accept that something serious needs to be done. Yesterday in Aintree University Hospital and the Royal Liverpool University Hospital, there were 279 coronavirus-positive patients—the highest number in any English hospital. There is substantial and widespread community transmission, with 600 cases per 100,000, and not only in student areas. There is a worryingly high incidence of spread to vulnerable groups, particularly people over 65 years old, and 31 are in critical care, so something definitely needs to be done However, I worry that the way in which the Government have handled the pandemic and its manifestations so far, and the impact that this has had on the situation in the north-west, is not helping. There is a widespread feeling that lockdown was lifted in Liverpool city region before cases had fallen far enough. The failings and increasingly poor performance of the nationally arranged test and trace system are making control of the virus much harder. People are waiting many days to get results. Many contacts of those testing positive are going untraced until it is too late for isolation to make a big difference The lack of discussion and candour until recently and even engagement with local leaders, Mayors and MPs means that there is a trust issue. That was worsened by yesterday’s briefing, at which the CMO suggested he was not confident that the tier 3 base measures would stop the epidemic growing, which the Prime Minister told the House they would. We then learned from the SAGE minutes, as my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) said, about widespread scientific advice not being followed three weeks ago. We need—I urge the Minister—more transparency and more openness from Government. We do not have enough of that. Let us have the information in real time and let us work on it together Most of all, we need proper financial support for the people on Merseyside affected by these serious restrictions. Tier 3 measures are going to devastate some of our lowest-paid workers. We cannot defeat the virus on the cheap and we should not do it on the basis of the living standards of the poorest. The assistance proposed so far is inadequate to the task According to the TUC, there are 41,000 people in the city region area who might benefit from the local furlough scheme, but there are many, many thousands more whose businesses will not be forced to close but who will not benefit by one penny from these proposals or from this support. It is not enough. More is going to have to be done to support local people in tier 3 areas and to prevent penury from following the pandemic.
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Deborah Angela Elspeth Marie Abrahams (Labour, Centre-left): I would like to make the following points based on my 20 years’ experience as a former public health consultant Unfortunately, I do not believe that the new tier system and measures that were introduced yesterday are sufficient to contain the virus. The localised approach will not work because of seeding. The virus travels where people come from. I came down on the train yesterday—I talked to the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale West (Sir Graham Brady) about this point—and there might have been people who were asymptomatic who unknowingly have spread the virus, unfortunately. There may also have been people who wanted to exercise their personal choice, who have the virus and knowingly exposed people to that risk. Unless the Government are prepared to set up roadblocks across the M1, M6, M62 and all other routes to and from the north, I am afraid that, just as happened in the first wave in Italy, the virus will spread To understand what we need to do now, we must understand how we got to this position. It is abundantly clear, as has already been said, that the national test and trace programme is not fit for purpose. In spite of clear WHO guidance, it was not fully operational in June when the first lockdown measures were eased, and as a consequence it has failed to cope with the predicted rise in infections ever since. On top of that there were, unfortunately, significant specific failures. I support the calls of the CMO, SAGE and others for a short circuit break to help drive down infection rates, but that should be at the national level. Any circuit break period should be used to undertake the transfer of test and trace to local public health departments. That must be accompanied by full resource transfer. Currently, less than 10% of the money used by local authorities at a local level has been reimbursed by the Government. That is unjustifiable and unsustainable, and it must be resolved In addition, the circuit break should be used first to ensure that the NHS and social care are fully prepared. They must have adequate PPE. They must have flu vaccines. They must have regular testing regimes. We should identify vulnerable people for supportive shielding, and not via some algorithm. We need to define exactly how we are going to support people in a way that does not mean they will be detrimentally isolated. We must also make sure we have simple, coherent messaging with local community engagement, and I support what the Government are trying to do with the simplification. We must also make sure that we have monitoring and enforcement capacity All workers and businesses need to be fully supported during any circuit break. We are at war with the virus. The Treasury needs to recognise that and respond adequately. Finally, the Government must recognise that covid is a disease of poverty.
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Rebecca Long-Bailey (Labour, Centre-left): Madam Deputy Speaker, "I am not confident, and nor is anybody confident, that the tier 3 proposals for the highest rates…would be enough to get on top of it." Those were the words last night of the chief medical officer, but sadly the Government knew this in September, when SAGE scientists advised the immediate introduction of a list of measures including a circuit breaker. In the following days, the Prime Minister went ahead with only the work-from-home U-turn and the 10 pm curfew. Now we know the truth. Last night, we saw that the SAGE minutes clearly stated that the curfew measure was likely to have a marginal impact, as it also seems the Government’s tiered approach will do Further, after the initial lockdown, any semblance of economic normality that would have kept the public safe was predicated on a comprehensive test, track and trace system, but with people still making vast round trips to get a test and risking their details being lost in an Excel spreadsheet never to be seen again, it is clear that we do not have a comprehensive testing system. And how can we forget Operation Moonshot? Salford was to be one of the pilot areas testing the Moonshot programme. However, my local council confirmed to me this morning that, some time ago now, it asked the Department of Health and Social Care to share the clinical validity data behind this new technology. To date, that query remains unanswered, and until this morning Salford City Council had been told to pause the programme. So can the Secretary confirm his current plans for the development of mass testing We all know what needs to be done. Any resumption of normal life depends on bringing the infection rate down, followed by robust test, trace and isolate systems, but for this to happen, we need clear direction from Government, and our businesses and workers need economic support to do what is required of them. So far, the Chancellor’s support still does not extend to the more than 3 million people who are excluded, and the watering down of economic support means that, even under tier 2, many businesses and workers across Greater Manchester will see a significant drop in income that they will not be able to sustain. So it seems we have a choice here: either we do not follow the science and instead impose the misery of prolonged tier 2 and tier 3 restrictions in many areas with little economic support, and cases and deaths will rise; or we follow the science and bring down transmission with a short national circuit breaker and a reform to test, track, trace and isolate. Frankly, the pandemic strategy so far has been akin to throwing a glass of water on a chip pan fire, and the Government need to change course today.
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Nadia Edith Whittome (Labour, Centre-left): A week ago, Nottingham showed for the first time a dramatic increase in our covid-19 infection rate. We needed immediate action from the Government, but instead all we got was confusion and delay. We were left in the dark for a week, with no action and no communication from the Government, and during that time the infection rate doubled to be the highest in the country. The saddest thing about that is that it was avoidable The Government have failed us time and again during this crisis. They failed to protect elderly people and vulnerable people, who died at an alarming rate in care homes and nursing homes. They failed to implement a test and trace system and they failed to listen to the OECD’s advice that the best way to protect the economy was to prevent a second wave, instead telling people one minute to go out to pubs, to eat out to help out, and then blaming them for doing so the next. The Government prioritised the interests of the economy over saving lives, yet failed to do both, and we are now faced with the worst recession in the developed world Last week, MPs, councillors and members of the public were left to find out in the press that we were due to go under a local lockdown, without any details of what that would look like for residents and for businesses. People in Nottingham have made enormous sacrifices during this pandemic, but frankly people are fed up. People want the Government to do their part. That means a serious economic package to protect jobs and businesses, and fixing the privatised Serco test and trace system. Are the Government so wedded to privatisation that even when it is utterly failing and public health is at risk they just plough on? We also need to extend the eviction ban so that no one loses their home during this time We know that lockdowns work only if people can afford to self-isolate, so why is it that, eight months into this virus, statutory sick pay is still £95 a week? The Secretary of State said that he could not live on that, so why are my constituents expected to? My final question to the Minister, in the last few seconds, is why have the Government not even followed their own scientific advice, which was to ban households mixing, close pubs and bring all university teaching online? How many people have to die before the Government get a grip of this virus?
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Angela Eagle (Labour, Centre-left): I believe that the Government should have brought all these measures to Parliament from the beginning, and it should not have taken a revolt on the Tory Back Benches for us to debate these statutory instruments. Why? Because through debates in Parliament we can persuade the public that the Government are making the right decisions, and we can challenge the Government and make them explain why they are making certain decisions From the beginning of the pandemic there was widespread support for what the Government were doing, but since Dominic Cummings’ trip to Durham, where his rule breaking was met with impunity by the Prime Minister, we have seen an increase in confusion and the rules get more complex. We have also seen people’s good will turn into cynicism. The advice over the summer about eating out to help out, or people being told to go back to work, then to work from home and not go out or even go to the pub, caused confusion and ill will. That is making it much harder to persuade our constituents that this is what they should be doing, and that the Government have a plan. We need transparency and honesty, and to be able to trust what the Government are doing Yesterday, my local authority was put into tier 3. We know that the Government have decided to keep universities and workplaces open, against the advice of SAGE. That leaves them with only socialising to try to press down on the virus. All they can do is restrict socialising in private or public. Given that there were 41 deaths in the past week in the north-west, I understand the need to do it, but we cannot just have local lockdowns on the cheap. The current furlough-lite is just not a good enough system to ensure that hospitality and jobs are properly protected, and 67% of wages is just not enough. We are abandoning many hundreds of thousands of jobs and many fantastic businesses in hospitality and entertainment to go to the wall without support I want to support the Government, but the Government also need to share their thinking and be much more transparent and open about the scientific advice and what works. They also need to be far more generous, especially in tier 3 areas, with the support they are willing to put in to keep local economies, local jobs and local businesses alive, so that we can all fight to get this virus down.
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Michael Robert Hill (Labour, Centre-left): It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Andrea Jenkyns). She makes a valid point that this is a public health crisis Over a week ago, my constituency of Hartlepool was placed under lockdown. It is currently in tier 2 of the new measures. Yes, it was requested by the local authority that such action be taken, but not in the guise in which it formed itself in the current measures. Lockdown was imposed on Hartlepool via a Government press release. Yesterday morning at 9 am, there was a hastily arranged conference call, hosted by a Minister, with all north-east leaders, yet Hartlepool, together with other authorities in the Tees valley, was left off the phone call. On behalf of my council, I would like the Minister to answer why they were not included in a phone call on the new measures in the north-east of England. If that was a mistake, has it been rectified or when will it be rectified? Consultation with my local authority has so far been woeful Turning to the public health issues, now that the whole of the Tees valley is under tier 2 we can hopefully work together and set party politics aside for the public good. Collectively, our local authorities face important challenges and they deserve to have appropriate resources allocated to them. In my council, it is estimated that £4.5 million is needed to provide extra support during lockdown. We desperately need to see a strategy developed by the Government for ending lockdown. Test and trace needs to be devolved, so that local environmental health teams, who know the patch and have the knowledge, can provide a more effective service. We need much more to assist us to get through tier 2. It is a public health crisis. I urge the Government to improve their communications and to answer the question I put earlier.
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Charlotte Louise Nichols (Labour, Centre-left): Increasingly, it feels like the north is being treated as an afterthought, with decisions taken by people in Whitehall who could not even point to Warrington on a map. We had absolutely none of the promised engagement over the weekend with our local authority and there was a concerted push to make us subject to the tier 3 restrictions of the Liverpool city region, despite not being a part of those conversations or, indeed, of the Liverpool city region. It has been insulting to be invited to a meeting for a totally different county by the Department for Health, and to be told what restrictions we would be subject to only minutes before the Prime Minister made his announcement, when the details had all been leaked to The Times days earlier, causing huge anxiety locally The real irony, however, is that many of our local businesses would be better off if we had gone into tier 3, as the financial support for tier 2 is totally inadequate. Between the 10 pm curfew and the introduction of the ban on households mixing indoors, hospitality venues in Warrington lost up to 90% of their business in a single week. No business could be expected to survive that indefinitely and the job support scheme does little to help, pushing families into poverty. Far from the Government’s stated aspiration of levelling up, we are being levelled down in the north-west by coronavirus and a Government who seem to think we should be grateful for the limited support we have had The worst part is hearing from constituents who have lost hope. The mental health impacts of all they have had to endure will be lasting and significant. As well as getting serious about financial support for our region to deal with the virus, we urgently need to see increased support to deal with the mental health crisis that we face. To give people hope, we need to have it explained what thresholds Warrington needs to meet to be moved out of tier 2 and into tier 1, with the rest of the country. With something to work towards, compliance will naturally increase, and it will give us back some of the control that we feel we have lost. We all want to do our bit, but the Government must do theirs. That means greater engagement, transparency and accountability and not a lockdown for the north on the cheap.
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Naseem Akhtar Shah (Labour, Centre-left): Does the hon. Gentleman agree that we should thank local health officials, particularly the directors of public health such as in Bradford West, and that they have the real answers? That expertise is very local and this needs to be led locally, as opposed to nationally with "one size fits all" in cases such as his?
Public Health: Coronavirus Regulations — House of Commons, 2020-10-13
Topic: Health
Karin Marguerite Smyth (Labour, Centre-left): Bristol, in tier 1, has fortunately been able to maintain low transmissions, and hence admissions to hospital and, so far, deaths. We want it to stay that way. My experience of working in the local health system is that this is in large part due to good relationships that have been hard developed over many years, particularly through local resilience forums. There are good relationships with Public Health England and directors of public health. Working together is sustaining some very good work locally, but there is no room for complacency. We recognise that the economy—wealth creation—is crucial to good local health, and we need support from the Government for both those things In the short time available, I want to highlight issues around isolating, shielding, and test and trace. As well as reducing social contact, which the Secretary of State talked a lot about, the key to transmission reduction is isolating, but isolation support is woeful and for communities with little money, which face higher unemployment, the situation is worsened. We have to be much more honest about the incentives and the way they work to support people who are isolating. It is hard and the knock-on effects on families are substantial and disruptive. Again, we need local public health people who know their communities to help support those who are isolating. We need much more support for people who are shielding. People do not understand why it is now different from how it was back in March Across the House, we all know that the test and trace system is not working. It is causing chaos for the frontline, particularly care home managers and school leaders. There is a balancing act to be done here. Again, we need local support to inform those school leaders and care home managers about how to interpret the guidance. That cannot just be done through the algorithm. It is a disgrace that the test and trace system is not led by a civil servant whom we can hold to account. I do not know how we can hold the Baroness—I do not know whether the courtesies of the House allow me to name her—to account for the system. That must be changed. It is crucial that we can hold people to account. I accept that the legislation was rushed through in March, and perhaps there was a reason for not using the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 or the public health legislation we are debating today. The Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee has scrutinised this, produced our report and we now need to move to a better way forward. We cannot keep dragging the Government here week after week to do our job, which is to agree to disagree, to scrutinise and to hold to account, based on our experience, the work we do in Committees and our work locally. It would improve the legislation. It would improve local trust, and ultimately that supports the front line and saves lives.