Covid-19
Debate between Lord Bethell and Lord Taylor of Goss Moor(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Bethell (Con) [V]
I am grateful to the noble Baroness for giving me an opportunity to address this issue, and I hope the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, will forgive me for overlooking it in my opening answers. The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, is entirely right: ventilation is critical—but it is also challenging. On air filters, we have to understand better the science of whether filtration really makes an impact on the spread of the virus. I would not want investment in a large amount of ventilation infrastructure that did not actually have an impact. I agree that we have a lot to learn from the Victorians, who understood these matters very well. We must understand how modern buildings, which are often airtight to achieve environmental qualifications, may need to be adapted to get fresh air within them. We may also need to change our lifestyles, so that more socialising, eating and drinking is done outside—something that I, as an outdoorsy person, would very much welcome.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD) [V]
I am sure that the Minister is alive to the fact that the beta variant is less susceptible to the AstraZeneca vaccine in particular, with effectiveness as low as 10%. Perhaps, therefore, he found it understandable that the Government put further restrictions on travel from France. However, could he explain why we are not doing it with Greece, where the levels of that variant are higher than in France, or Spain, where they are much higher than in France?
Lord Bethell (Con) [V]
The noble Lord makes an important and serious point—but could I just address one matter first? The AstraZeneca vaccine has very low efficacy on a single dose against beta—around 14% or 15%—but on two doses its effectiveness is significantly higher. None the less, his broad point is right. As we vaccinate the nation, the variants that escape the vaccine will gain a natural advantage, and those will be the ones that begin to outperform the highly infectious variants such as delta that work so well among the unvaccinated. When it comes to travel, the analysis is complex. We have taken a precautionary approach with France, which I think is right, because there is a large amount of beta in France, but we are looking at all countries all the time, and we will take whatever steps are necessary to protect these shores.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Lord Bethell and Lord Taylor of Goss Moor(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, I hear my noble friend’s comments loud and clear, and I think that we have hit some kind of inflection point where our focus is now much more on the learning-to-live rather than the saving-life dimension. I say that with unbelievable caution, having, as noble Lords know, been through all sorts of rollercoasters of expectation over the past year. I am extremely hopeful that the vaccine has laid out a clear path out of this pandemic. It is one that is fragile, delicate and could be overturned at any point, but, so far, the vaccine has seemed to be extremely durable.
On the mental health of the nation, I completely agree with my noble friend. It has put huge pressure on families, loved ones and communities. There have been positive benefits—my honourable friend Nadine Dorries spoke movingly about that to the Health and Social Care Committee the week before last. Some families in some communities have been drawn closer together— there is good evidence for that—but, for a great many, there has been a huge amount of pressure. I, for one, look forward very much to some lessening of that burden.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD) [V]
The Minister has just commented that there may be red-list countries for some time to come, and that is clearly correct. That is a reflection of two things. First, many countries, particularly poorer countries, have not been able to vaccinate at our rates—not even close to that. The changes to Covid, which are making its spread both more easy and more dangerous mean that it is ripping through many of those countries and threatens many, many more deaths. Secondly, in doing so, it increases the chances of variants being bred in those countries and ultimately finding their way here—we know from experience that they will find their way here sooner or later. So, while feeling more optimistic about the situation here in the UK, what can we do to further ramp up the effort to support countries around the globe that are struggling to vaccinate their populations, struggling to save lives and, frankly, struggling to stop the creation of new variants that threaten this country?
Lord Bethell (Con)
The noble Lord is entirely right: those three things are linked. We cannot live in a world where there is a high infection rate in large parts of it, where new variants prosper and where we cannot travel. That would be inhuman and unpragmatic. I met with the CEOs of the major companies that manufacture the vaccines in Oxford during the G7, and we discussed this point in great detail. It is frustrating, but I also have optimism that the manufacturing capability in the hubs around the world—in the geographical places where populations live—are being built today and, by the middle of next year, there will be a huge amount of vaccine capacity in order to address this problem. It is frustrating that it cannot happen overnight, but vaccine manufacturing capability takes time to build up, as we know only too well. However, those investments are taking place, and I believe that, as a world, we can beat this pandemic together.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Lord Bethell and Lord Taylor of Goss Moor(2 years, 10 months ago)
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Lord Bethell (Con)
I am extremely grateful for my noble friend’s comments on the Olympics, and we wish our Olympic champions all the best luck. We keep our fingers crossed for Tokyo, under very difficult circumstances. On the vaccination programme, he is entirely right: positive influences are key. It has been interesting that the positive influences we think have made the biggest impact are not necessarily only the celebrities—they are community influencers who work in clinical settings and are present at a grass-roots level in communities. That is why a large volume of videos, endorsements, community meetings and answering quite reasonable, but sometimes very sensitive, questions from the public have been the essence of our vaccination communications programme. It seems to be extremely successful: the younger age groups seem to be stepping up for the vaccine in proportions that we could not have believed possible some months ago, and we hope very much that this will continue.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD) [V]
My Lords, my 13 year-old son is a chorister at Truro Cathedral, where they have composed a song, “Gee Seven”, which 25,000 children across this country and others will sing online to G7 leaders tomorrow. He says the thing that they want most is for the parents and grandparents of children in poorer countries that have not had access to vaccines to get the access that parents and grandparents have had in this country, so that those other children can feel safe about their families. Will the Minister and his colleagues think about that before vaccinating teenagers in this country, who are not at great risk? The COVAX programme is currently 192 million doses short of its targets for supporting poorer countries. Incidentally, if that is not enough morally, he might also consider that so long as we are not successfully vaccinating in these poorer countries, the chances of new and more dangerous variants coming to this country and causing deaths again are all the more likely.
Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord points out a dreadful dilemma that is on our minds all the time. I completely agree with his point that supporting those in the developing world is a priority and responsibility for those of us in the developed world. His son is entirely right that we should be thinking very much of those who are vulnerable or in urgent need as we consider our vaccination programme. But our responsibility as a Government is to the British people. We must look after the British people first, and there is no benefit to anywhere in the world if Britain comes close to shaking off this awful virus but falls over at the last minute because we have not seen the job through. We intend to support COVAX in the way he describes—in particular, the manufacturing of the vaccine in regional hubs. There, the AstraZeneca and Oxford vaccine has played a critical role. The profit-free availability and generous licensing arrangements being offered by AstraZeneca are having a huge impact on the global rollout of the vaccine. In the meantime, we are absolutely driving through the vaccine programme here in the UK, in the knowledge that, if Britain can emerge safely, that is of benefit not only to British taxpayers and patients but to the whole world.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Lord Bethell and Lord Taylor of Goss Moor(3 years, 1 month ago)
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Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, we would not ordinarily expect a big announcement on NHS funding at a Budget such as this, and the truth is that we are not through the woods yet. It is impossible to predict what funds the NHS will need this year or next until we are through this pandemic, and while we are spending time today taking pleasure in celebrating the vaccine, the honest truth is that danger is still around the corner and we do not yet know that we are truly through this. When we are able to say that for sure, it will be possible to take a moment to decide on NHS funding. In the meantime, we remain committed to our manifesto pledges on hospital building and on recruitment, and on both those matters, we have made an enormous amount of progress. The Prime Minister has been crystal clear about his commitment to social care funding reform, and he stands by that commitment.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD) [V]
My Lords, given the undoubted success in the UK of the rollout of the vaccination programme, on which all involved are to be congratulated, our attention must turn, as my noble friend Lady Sheehan said, to consider the global operation because this disease is a global issue, not a United Kingdom one. The United Kingdom cannot live normally without the security of knowing that it is being tackled successfully globally. Will the Government use their chairmanship of the G7 to put in place and publish a global response action plan that goes further than what we have seen already and certainly further than simply donating spare vaccines?
Lord Bethell (Con)
The noble Lord puts it extremely well. We have four key themes in the health track of the G7. The first is pandemic preparedness in the round; the second is clinical trial data—that is an essential building block for pandemic preparedness; the third is medical data transfer—one thing we have tripped over repeatedly in our international collaboration on pandemic reform is the difficulty of sharing data; and the fourth is AMR, which is the threat on the horizon. If we have learned one thing from this pandemic, it is not to underestimate the threat from anti-microbial resistance.
Covid-19
Debate between Lord Bethell and Lord Taylor of Goss Moor(3 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Bethell (Con)
My noble friend of all people should know that it is an unfortunate comparison to make between the quite legitimate efforts of the Government to keep out killer viruses with those of a nasty East German regime for which I have no sympathy whatever. We have seen that a large amount of business that we previously thought required travel does not require travel. I must admit I am extremely surprised by the news that the Council of Europe thought it was a great idea to get together for a meeting. It is a decision I am querying, and when I get back to the department I will chat to my Foreign Office colleagues to see if that really was a sensible thing to happen.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD) [V]
My Lords, while the Act may have long existed, its attachment to mis-filling out forms certainly has not. It is hard to imagine that at any stage Parliament intended that filling out a form misleadingly, however serious the circumstances, should attract a 10-year sentence. Surely this is something, right or wrong, whatever the principles and whatever the Government might believe is the right thing to do, that should go through Parliament for approval. A 10-year sentence, equivalent to many firearms charges and other serious offences, is surely something that should be subject to parliamentary scrutiny before it is imposed.
Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord seems to be forgetting that it is not Parliament that is going to be sending people to prison but the courts, and courts are perfectly capable of interpreting the law. They are perfectly capable of assessing the nature and gravity of the offence. I am simply repeating the section of the Act on which people will be prosecuted if they commit a fraud. I am reminding noble Lords and all those thinking about committing fraud on their passenger locator form that the maximum sentence for committing fraud is 10 years, and it will be up to the courts to decide what kind of sentence they apply.
Hotel Quarantine for Travellers
Debate between Lord Bethell and Lord Taylor of Goss Moor(3 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Bethell (Con)
I could not agree with the noble Lord more: the right to live trumps all other rights. It is a sad fact that, while we would normally do everything we could in a liberal democracy to protect rights such as the freedom to travel, under current circumstances these are trumped by the right to live, and that is why I call on all people to limit their travel wherever they humanly can. There is simply no excuse for going to Dubai, taking Instagram photographs of yourself and claiming that that is business travel. You are putting your friends and loved ones at risk, and this Government will not tolerate it.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD) [V]
My Lords, given the significant community transmission of the South African variant, how confident is the Minister that we have in place today sufficient measures to stop the equivalent happening again? It does appear the Government are again running behind events.
Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, matters are evenly balanced. There are 143 confirmed and probable cases of the variant first identified in South Africa. Most of those have been connected with travel to South Africa, and those involved have been isolated. There are around a dozen in respect of which the chain of transmission is not fully understood. We have put in place a substantial team of dedicated tracing professionals to track down those variants of concern, along with teams in the relevant postcodes, so we are doing both a fire blanket of testing within the community and forensic detective analysis to track down the chain of transmission. It is my belief that that will be enough to keep the spread of the virus under control in this country, but we are watchful and concerned.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Lord Bethell and Lord Taylor of Goss Moor(3 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Bethell (Con)
I pay tribute to colleagues and officials at Downing Street and the Cabinet Office who have organised an extremely detailed, flexible and fast-moving decision-making arrangement through the COVID-O and Covid Gold process. That has proven, as has often been discussed in this Chamber, incredibly quick at responding to events. In terms of spending, I pay tribute to my noble friend Lord Agnew in the Cabinet Office, who is leading the fraud and financial scrutiny efforts to ensure that the money spent on taxpayers’ behalf goes to the right places.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD) [V]
Does the Minister agree that we cannot afford to destroy the economy again and that it would be immoral to destroy the educational future of our children? That implies that people must curtail their social opportunities. It is also incumbent on Government to recognise that education and the economy working will lead to increased cases. Do the Government not therefore need to step up and reintroduce the targeted work on those most vulnerable to this disease, as we know who they are?
Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, I entirely agree with the noble Lord’s sentiments. The economy and education are critical. I reiterate the Government’s commitment to ensuring that the economy survives in the best possible way and that our children get the education they need. However, it is not quite as binary as he describes. If the public abide by the behaviours recommended in the guidelines, we can enjoy a far greater range of activities than would be the case under a major lockdown. Either way, we are committed to protecting the most vulnerable. I point to the substantial financial investment in protecting those who are shielded and in social care.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Lord Bethell and Lord Taylor of Goss Moor(3 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, I pay tribute to the noble Lord’s campaigning on this issue; he has contributed to the Government changing their strategy on mask wearing. However, we are here discussing the onerous burden that these measures put on people in this country, and we have to be careful not to overburden them. The CMO’s guidance on masks is that the science remains ambiguous. I know the noble Lord does not agree with that, but that is the CMO’s advice. We have come a long way on masks in order to change policy on this and, as the scientific evidence changes, we will review that policy.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD) [V]
Since the Minister wants to keep things simple, could he explain to families that are separated what the rules now are? In my case, I am a single father of three young boys who live with me every other week. They live in a household of six on the other weeks, and it includes another child who also lives in another household part of the time. Which of us are allowed to get together when?
Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, that is the pub-quiz question of all pub-quiz questions. There are special provisions for families that are, like the noble Lord’s, separated or complex. Those guidelines have been published, I believe, and I would be glad to send him an email with a link to them.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Lord Bethell and Lord Taylor of Goss Moor(3 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, it is not a question of blaming anyone or of in any way condemning people’s natural curiosity. However, the bottom line is that we have only so many resources, and people know full well whether they are showing symptoms of some sort. It is not appropriate that someone who shows no symptoms whatever uses valuable, scarce resources that could and should be used for more important priorities. We could not be more clear about that. Universities are using private testing facilities, and we applaud and support them on that. It is my sincere hope that one day we will have sufficient testing facilities to be able to offer everyone a test whenever they like. However, we do not live in that world today, and that is why I deliver the message that I do.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD) [V]
The Minister has just said that a significant plank of the policy is not the science but communications. I fear that the Moonshot programme falls into exactly that category. I do not believe that it can be delivered at the scale that the Prime Minister has talked of, but, if it could, it would throw up false results that would overwhelm track and testing and mislead people, throwing both education and the economy into further chaos. Is not the right policy to target the groups that we know are vulnerable to this disease with the protections that they need, starting with care homes, and to allow the rest of us, and the economy and education, to move forward?
Lord Bethell (Con)
The noble Lord is right to be concerned about false positive results. However, our experience, our piloting and the emerging technologies suggest that that will be the case in a relatively small proportion of the tests and is entirely manageable within a mass population testing system. With regard to the idea that we can somehow identify vulnerable groups and target them pre-emptively, I wish that that were true, but this disease constantly confounds expectations and turns up in places where we least expect it. If we could tell people that they were going to get the disease, we would not have this problem in the first place.