Covid-19 Update

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Tuesday 9th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

The hon. Gentleman is right to raise that point. It was a concern in making the decision, and I have set out how I have taken that into account. However, I assure him that the issue will be monitored on a day-by-day basis by our colleagues in NHS England and of course the Department itself, and that whatever workforce planning is necessary will be done.

[Matt Hancock (West Suffolk) (Con)]

I warmly welcome the Secretary of State’s decision and the cross-party consensus behind it. Medicine is based on science and the vaccine is the best of science, and we should use all the science and tools at our disposal to keep people safe. That is the justification for this policy. I support the extension of the decision in due course to flu. I am glad that the Secretary of State is keeping that option open, and urge him to continue to push on that as soon as is practicable.

May I invite my right hon. Friend to join me in saying that, given that there is cross-party consensus and that the announcement has now been made, this is clearly going to happen; and that all those working in the NHS, including those who have so far been hesitant, should therefore come forward as soon as possible to get the vaccines? They are going to have to get them, so better to get them sooner rather than later.

[Sajid Javid]

I agree wholeheartedly. May I take this opportunity to thank my right hon. Friend again for the work that he has done in Government, and particularly in this Department in laying the foundations of our successful vaccination programme? Without those foundations, we would not have been able to take this positive step today. He is right to point to the fact that vaccines work, and that they are safe and effective. Public Health England estimates that at least 230,000 hospitalisations and more than 100,000 deaths have been prevented by the vaccines. He is also right to say that now that the Government have made our decision, subject to the will of Parliament, this will happen; and that there is already an opportunity from this moment for people to make the positive choice. In doing so, we will help those people in every way that we can.

Smoking Cessation: Prescription of E-cigarettes

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Monday 1st November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Maggie Throup]

My hon. Friend tempts me to say that he is a great role model. Perhaps he should try e-cigarettes and then probably try stopping smoking completely. He can put that message out across the Chamber about why levelling up is so important.

[Matt Hancock (West Suffolk) (Con)]

I welcome not only the Minister’s emphatic support for the cessation of smoking by 2030 as a target, but the cross-party support. We have seen in this short discussion today unanimous support for the use of e-cigarettes as a route out of smoking. The UK is one of the most advanced countries in the world in the proper evidence-led approach to the use of e-cigarettes. The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency is perfectly placed to herald that evidence and make sure the approach is evidence-based. Can she assure me that we will speed up the processes as much as possible? We must follow the evidence, but we must follow it rapidly.

[Maggie Throup]

I thank my right hon. Friend for the work he has done on this important issue. He is right that the MHRA’s expertise is recognised worldwide, so it is only right that it looks at it, and it provided clarification last week. As health disparities are so important, it is fantastic that we have cross-party support on the issue.

Oral Answers to Questions

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Tuesday 19th October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call Clive Betts—go on, Matt Hancock.

[Matt Hancock (West Suffolk) (Con)]

Thanks for the warning, Mr Speaker. I congratulate the Secretary of State and the new vaccines Minister—the Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Maggie Throup)—on the roll-out of booster jabs. Over 3 million have been administered so far. May I attempt to strengthen their hands by asking for some of the pop-up vaccination centres, such as the Brent mosque, to get going with these booster jabs so that we can make sure that people in all communities have access to these much needed boosters?

[Sajid Javid]

One of the reasons that our country has one of the most successful vaccination programmes in the world has been the efforts of my right hon. Friend, and I want to take this opportunity to thank him for that. He is right to point to the importance of access to vaccines, and making that more mobile is exactly what we are doing.

Use of Patient Data

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Thursday 24th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

I have come to the House today to answer this debate because of the importance of the subject matter and the importance of getting this right. I recognise and acknowledge the chequered history that my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) described, and I see that chequered history as one of the reasons that the NHS does not yet have the modern data architecture that it needs. Previous attempts—both the national programme for IT and care.data—have failed, so people have shied away from tackling this problem in a modern, secure and agile way.

I have come to demonstrate and to argue that there is no contradiction between high-quality security and privacy of the data held in a health system and the use of that data to save lives, because in a well-structured, well thought through system, both are enhanced. I profoundly believe that. I think that my right hon. Friend does too, and I agree with him when he says that we agree on aims; the key is the path. I agree with him, too, that the proper use of data has the potential to save hundreds of thousands of lives if we use it as safely as possible but also allow for the insights in the data to be discovered in order to promote better healthcare, better discoveries and the better operation of the NHS.

If someone did not believe that before, they could not have failed to be persuaded by it if they have looked at the experience of the last 18 months. We discovered that an old, cheap drug, dexamethasone, helped to reduce the likelihood of someone dying if they ended up in hospital with covid, and as a result it has saved around a million lives across the globe. We discovered that in the NHS because of the data that we have and because of a well-structured, high-quality data architecture project to find out which drugs worked.

We know that the NHS will operate better if different parts of it can compare their performance better. We also know that patients want their data to be used better, because the frustration expressed to me so frequently by patients who are asked over and over “Who are you and what’s wrong with you?”, when that data should be available to the clinicians who need to see it, is palpable. And we know that the clinicians in the NHS want high-quality use of data so that they do not waste so much time on outdated IT and can treat the people in their care better. All these things matter, and they will save lives.

The current GP data service, GPES—the general practice extraction service—is over 10 years old, and it needs to be replaced. The project that my right hon. Friend referred to, GP data for planning and research, is there to unlock the intrinsic benefits of this data, but that must be done in a way that maintains the highest possible standards of security. The goals of this, and the outcomes when we get it right—I say when, not if—are that it will reduce the bureaucracy and workload for GPs, it will strengthen privacy and security, and it will replace around 300 separate data collections with one single collection.

If I may take my right hon. Friend back to 2018, I piloted through this House the Data Protection Act 2018, in which we brought the GDPR into UK law and strengthened provisions for data security. You may remember that, Mr Deputy Speaker, because you may have received a few emails about it at the time from companies asking whether you were still happy for them to hold your data. You could have replied, “No.” In fact, I came off quite a few lists I was no longer interested in receiving emails from because I was reminded that I was still on them and that I could opt out. I think the time has come for a similar approach—an update—to the way we think about health data in this country that puts security and privacy at its heart and, in so doing, unlocks the insights in that data and allows us to hold the trust of the citizens we serve.

The way I think about that is this. Current law considers that citizens do not control their health data, but the NHS does. For instance, GP data is controlled by GPs. However, the approach we should take is that citizens are in charge of their data. It is our data. The details of my bunion are a matter for me, and me primarily. I will not have anyone in the NHS tell me whether I can or cannot disclose the details of my bunion—it is going fine, thank you very much for asking. It matters to me, even though it is a completely uncontroversial health condition, but, as my right hon. Friend set out, for many people their health data is incredibly sensitive and it is vital that it is kept safe.

On the question at hand, the programme—GP data for planning and research—will be underpinned by the highest standards of safety and security. Like my right hon. Friend, I am a huge fan of the progress and advances we have seen in trusted research environments. Those are the safe and secure places for bringing together data, where researchers can access the data or, more accurately, the insights in the data while maintaining the highest standards of privacy.

I, too, am an enormous fan of Dr Ben Goldacre and his team. The OpenSAFELY project has shown the benefits that TREs can bring, because they allow us to support urgent research and to find the insights in the data while protecting privacy. During the pandemic, the project was absolutely fundamental to our response. In fact, it existed before the pandemic, but really came into its own during the pandemic. For instance, it was the first project to find underlying risk factors for covid-19. OpenSAFELY was the first project around the world to find statistically and significantly that obesity makes it more likely that someone will die of covid. That was an important fact, discovered through this project and without disclosing anybody’s body mass index in doing so. That is therefore the approach that we will take.

I can tell my right hon. Friend and the House that I have heard people’s concerns about using dissemination of pseudonymised data. We will not use that approach in the new GPDPR. The new system will instead use trusted research environments. All data in the system will only ever be accessible through a TRE. This means that the data will always be protected in the secure environment. Individual data will never be visible to the researcher, and we will know, and will publish, who has run what query or used which bit of data. The question was asked: who has access to what data, and who knows about it? The answer is that we should all know about it and that people should have access in a trusted way, but to be able to find insights in the data, not people’s individual personalised data itself.

I hope that that will help to build trust. It will mean a different way of operating for data researchers, but I disagree with my right hon Friend that it will allow us only to get 80% or 90% of the research benefit. A well structured TRE allows us to find more insight from the data, not least because the data could be better curated, and therefore more people can spend more time finding the insights in the data, rather than curating it over and over again. The dangers that come with the dissemination of pseudonymised data are removed.

It will take some time to move over to the new system, hence I have delayed its introduction, but we have also made that delay to ensure that more people can hear about it. That is the other reason that I came to the House today: I want people to be engaged in the project. People are engaged in their health like never before, and in their health data like never before, in part because of the pandemic. If we think about the NHS app, which is no doubt in everyone’s pocket—it is certainly in mine—if we think about the covid app, which has been downloaded 25 million times, we have never seen people more interested in their health data. We have never seen a greater connection, and we should use that to make sure that consent, when it is given, is given fully and properly.

I can assure the House we have an extremely high benchmark for who can access data. We have put in place a rigorous and independent approvals process, and audits are carried out to make sure the data is only being used for legitimate purposes. We will make sure that the right data can be accessed by the right people at the right time, but only by the right people at the right time. Both sides of that—that it can be accessed by people who need to see it, but only by the people who need to see it—are critical to getting this right.

On the question of the giving of that consent, it is crucial that we ensure that there is enough knowledge and understanding of these changes, that people are brought into the process, and that people know they have an opt-out. The research is clear: the majority of people are keen to allow their data to be used to help to save other people’s lives, but they want to know they have an opt-out and are reassured if they have one, even if they stay opted in, because they know then that it is based on their consent.

This important programme will have an opt-out system. We are strengthening the opt-out system already, and we will take the time to work with those who are enthusiastic about using data properly, with those who ensure that questions of privacy and security are put to the fore, with the public and, of course, with clinicians to make sure that we strengthen this programme further in terms of its security and privacy, yes, but also in terms of the outcomes we can get from the data, so that we can find new treatments to help save lives.

This is an important programme. The use of data in the NHS will have a huge impact on the future of health and care in this country, and we want to take people with us on this mission. We have developed this policy together with doctors, patients and experts in data and privacy, and more than 200 prominent scientific and medical researchers have endorsed a statement of support for this mission, but we have decided to take some extra time to consult further and to be even more ambitious about what we want to deliver, with a new implementation date of 1 September.

One of the central lessons of the pandemic is that data makes a difference, so let us keep working to take this programme forward, learning the lessons of the crisis, so that we can build back better and use data to save lives.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

And the Secretary of State’s bunion.

Question put and agreed to.

Draft Health and Care Data Strategy

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd June 2021 Written Statements

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

I would like to inform the House that the draft strategy “Data Saves Lives: Reshaping health and social care with data” has been published today by NHSX and builds on the ground-breaking use of data during the pandemic.

Over the last 18 months, when facing this country’s greatest public health emergency for generations, one of the most powerful tools at our disposal has been the power of data. Data helped us to identify those who are most vulnerable to coronavirus and ask them to shield; the NHS covid-19 data store we set up was pivotal to our day-to-day response; and it powered vital research that helped us discover new treatments that saved lives across the world.

Under these proposals to deliver truly patient-centred care, everyone in England will be given better access to their own healthcare records and detailed information about exactly how they are used. Patients will be able to access test results, medications, procedures and care plans from across all parts of the health system. They will be able to have confidence that health and care staff have up-to-date information, regardless of the care setting, so they will no longer have to repeat details unnecessarily. By improving their access to data, people will also be able to manage appointments, refill medications and speak remotely, not just face to face, with health and care staff when needed.

This strategy not only seeks to bring people closer to their data, it will also support the NHS in creating a modernised system. The public need to be confident to share their data with the NHS, which will hold it securely on their behalf. These protections reflect the strict parameters for the use of data and security standards set out by the national data guardian for health and care. Today’s new strategy commits the NHS to going even further with a commitment to publish the first transparency statement setting out how health and care data has been used across the sector by 2022. Modern use of patient data saves lives and maintains the highest levels of privacy. The two goals are complementary, not contradictory.

We are publishing this today in draft form so that we have the opportunity to engage with the public and right across the health and care system. The learning from this will be included in a final version to be published in the early autumn.

I will deposit a copy of the draft strategy in the Libraries of both Houses.

[HCWS111]

Coronavirus

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Wednesday 16th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

I beg to move,

That the Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (Steps and Other Provisions) (England) (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2021 (S.I., 2021, No. 705) dated 15 June 2021, a copy of which was laid before this House on 15 June, be approved.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

With this we shall debate the following motion:

That

(1) the Order of 2 June 2020 (Proceedings during the pandemic (No. 2)), as amended on 1 July, 2 September and 22 October 2020 and 25 March, the Order of 4 June 2020 (Virtual participation in proceedings during the pandemic), as amended on 1 July, 2 September, 22 October and 30 December 2020 and 25 March, and the Orders of 23 September 2020 (Proxy voting during the pandemic), 3 November 2020 (Proxy voting during the pandemic (No. 2)), and 25 February (Sittings in Westminster Hall during the pandemic), as amended on 25 March, shall have effect until 22 July;

and

(2) the Order of 24 March 2020 (Select Committees (Participation and Reporting) (Temporary Order)) be amended as follows:

leave out paragraph (4) and insert “(4) this Order shall have effect until 22 July 2021.”

[Matt Hancock]

I bring to the House these regulations to change the date of implementation of step 4 of the Government’s road map. On 8 December last year, we fired the starting gun on the race between the vaccine and the virus and started delivering a programme that has allowed us to restore so many of the precious freedoms that we cherish. In the space of just six months, we have now given first doses of coronavirus vaccines to almost four in five adults in the UK, and we have given second doses to over 30 million people. We have made such rapid progress through the cohorts that, today, we are able to extend the offer of a vaccine to anyone aged 21 and over.

Thanks to the protection of the vaccination programme, huge advances in treatments like dexamethasone, which was discovered a year ago today, and the resolve of the British people in following the rules that this House has laid down, we have been able to take the first three steps on our road map, removing restrictions and restoring colour to the nation, but we have always said that we would take each step at a time and look at the data and our four tests before deciding whether to proceed. The regulations before the House today put into effect our decision to pause step 4 on our roadmap until 19 July. Before outlining the regulations that will put this into effect, I would like to set out why we made this difficult but essential decision.

Unfortunately, there has been a significant change since we started on our journey down the road map in February. A new variant has given the virus extra legs, both because it spreads more easily and because there is some evidence that the risk of hospitalisation is higher than for the alpha variant, which was, of course, previously dominant in this country. The delta variant now accounts for 96% of new cases. The number of cases is rising and hospitalisations are starting to rise, too—they are up 48% over the past week. The number of deaths in England is thankfully not rising and remains very low, but, as I told the House on Monday, we do not yet know the extent to which the link between hospitalisations and deaths has been broken, so we propose to give the NHS a few more crucial weeks to get those remaining jabs into the arms of those who need them.

Although we are taking the steps outlined in the regulations today, and I know this is disappointing for many people, we know that science has given us a solution. We must use this time to protect as many people as we can as quickly as we can, because even though the vaccination programme has been going at a blistering pace, there are still people who we must protect.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

Can I just ask my right hon. Friend what we expect to achieve in the four weeks? I think I am right in saying that there are 1.3 million people in priority groups one to nine who have yet to have a second dose of the vaccination. The good point is that that means we have vaccinated 96% of people in those groups, but I just wonder—after four weeks, I doubt that we will get to 100%, so there will still be a significant number of people in those groups not vaccinated with two doses, and at that point, there is still going to be some risk. My worry, and the worry of others, is that we are going to get to this point in four weeks’ time and we will just be back here all over again extending the restrictions. That is what we are concerned about.

[Matt Hancock]

No—on the contrary, that is our view of how far through the vaccination programme we need to get. We are not aiming to eradicate the virus in this country because that is not possible. Indeed, in the parts of the country where it has been tried, it has been found to be not possible. We are aiming to live with this virus like we do with flu. I can give my right hon. Friend an update: as of midnight last night, 1.2 million over-50s and 4.4 million over-40s have had their first jab, but not their second. We seek to get a second jab into a majority—not all, but a majority—of them by 19 July. The estimate is that by taking that pause in this step, we can save thousands of lives. I can tell my right hon. Friend that taking further time and pausing for longer is not estimated to save many more lives, because of the level of protection especially among the over-50s, who are, as we all know, the most likely to die from this disease.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State knows that I broadly agree with what he is doing today. He referred just now to us having to live with the virus as we do with flu. With flu, we do not require people to self-isolate, and we do not ask them to test and trace. My understanding is that the Government intend to keep test and trace on a mandatory, statutory basis all the way through the rest of this year and possibly until the end of March—or am I wrong?

[Matt Hancock]

With flu, of course, if people have symptomatic flu and are ill, they do tend to stay at home. Of course we have not done that on a mandatory basis before, but it is advisable that if people have symptoms of flu, they stay at home. For contacts, as the hon. Gentleman probably knows, we are already piloting an approach whereby instead of having to isolate as contacts, vaccinated people go into a testing regime. That is an approach that I am very attracted to for the future, especially as more and more people get vaccinated, because we know that the risk once vaccinated is so much lower.

We are accelerating the second doses, and we are reducing from 12 weeks to eight weeks the time from first to second jab for all those aged 40 and above. In fact, since I came to this House on Monday, I have rearranged my second jab to be eight weeks rather than 12 weeks after my first.

[Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)]

Me too—I have rearranged mine for tomorrow morning, in line with my right hon. Friend’s advice.

Further to the intervention from my right hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper), it is very clear that the regulations will be passed by the House today. Regulation 2(3) talks about substituting 18 July for 30 June, and the Prime Minister talked about 19 July being a “terminus”. The definition of a terminus is the end point—the end of the line. Would the Secretary of State categorise it in exactly those terms? I think our constituents want to know what 19 July means that 21 June did not.

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, I would characterise it in that way. Our goal, ahead of 19 July, is to take step 4. On the basis of the evidence so far, I am confident that we will not need more than the four weeks to get this job done and take step 4.

[Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con)]

Can my right hon. Friend give us a little more information about the rise in hospitalisations that he mentioned? Of those who are being hospitalised, how many are in the younger age group who were not yet eligible for the vaccine, and how many are above that age—in other words, those who were able to get the vaccine but chose not to?

[Matt Hancock]

My right hon. Friend makes a really important point. The answer is that the majority are in the younger age group who have not yet had the chance to be vaccinated. Just under one fifth of those going into hospital in the last week have had both jabs, about a fifth have had one jab and the majority have not had any. The majority are under the age of 50 and have not yet had the opportunity to have both jabs. I think there is a material difference when it comes to the state’s responsibility to offer the vaccine to all adults. The duty that we have when somebody has not been offered the vaccine is greater than the duty we have when we have offered a vaccine but somebody has chosen not to take it up. There is a material difference between those two situations that I think my right hon. Friend was getting at.

[Dame Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)]

May I just take what our right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox) said one step further? If I choose not to have, say, a yellow fever jab when I am going to a place that suffers yellow fever, the Government of the United Kingdom take no interest whatever in my illness status. When my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State says that he has less of a duty, surely what he means is that he has no duty at all. It is for people to take up the vaccine.

--- Later in debate ---

[Matt Hancock]

Up to a point, and the point is that, should that be taken as an absolute principle, there is a challenge should there be an overwhelming demand on the NHS that would impact on others. Of course, with a communicable disease, there is an impact on others in terms of spreading the disease, so we do have to have an eye to that. That is why I phrased it as I did, but in terms of my right hon. Friend’s argument, I think she and I concur on the broad thrust of the case being made.

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

My point is slightly niche. The reason why we developed all the vaccines was that thousands of Brits volunteered to trial them. There are now a number who trialled vaccines that are not yet approved, such as the Valneva vaccine, and who therefore cannot use the NHS app and some other things. Should they go for two shots of another vaccine, or will the Health Department take that into account?

[Matt Hancock]

Being certified as having had a vaccine includes being on a vaccine clinical trial. The deputy chief medical officer, Professor Jonathan Van-Tam, has written to participants in vaccine clinical trials, who are doing, as my right hon Friend says, a great service to their country and indeed to the world by offering themselves to have an unlicensed vaccine in order to check that it works. I am very grateful to all of them. We will not put them in a more difficult position because of that.

We will make sure that when it comes to someone proving that they have been certified as vaccinated, being on a clinical trial counts as certified and continues to count as certified during a grace period after they are unblinded, so that if they are in the placebo arm, they can get both jabs and will not be disadvantaged for being on the clinical trial. That is a very important point. I am very glad that right hon. Friend raises it. If anybody from any part of the House gets that question from a constituent, please point them to the comprehensive letter by Professor Jonathan Van-Tam that explains and reassures.

[Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, but then I will make some progress.

[Dr Murrison]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. May I commend him for the efforts he has put in to keeping colleagues informed and responding to their questions along the way? It has been extremely good. Can I press him on this two-week break point that he and the Prime Minister have referred to? What underpins that? Is it simply a desire to get through a certain number of vaccinations—a figure that he presumably already knows? Or is it uncertainty over the data as it currently exists, because if it is, and given that this should be led by the data, there is every likelihood that in the next few days, we will get some indication as to whether the increase in the delta variant incidence is being translated into intensive care unit admissions and deaths? Can he give me and others considering how to vote this evening any comfort on that two-week point? If we have the sense that there may indeed be a genuine break at that point—if those cases do not translate into deaths or ICU admissions—we will be a little more comfortable.

[Matt Hancock]

As so often, my right hon. Friend, who is one of the most astute medical practitioners in this House—crikey, I could get myself into trouble there, because all the medical practitioners in this House are astute, but he is also a public health expert. I will start again. My right hon. Friend’s point was a really good one and very astute. He is exactly right about our approach: the two-week review is a data review.

Up to around 10 days to a week before the decision making cut-off for the proposal to take step 4 on 21 June, it looked like hospitalisations were staying flat, despite rising case rates. We did not know whether that was because of a lag or because there was now going to be no cases turning into hospitalisations. That remains the case now for the link to the number of people dying, because the number of people dying each day in England is actually slightly falling at the moment—thank goodness —and there has not been a rise in the number of deaths following the rise in the case rates, which started about three weeks ago. Within a couple of weeks, we will know whether that continues to be flat or whether it rises a little. It has risen a little in Scotland; I just put that warning out there. That is precisely the sort of data that we will be looking at at the two-week point. We have been absolutely clear that the goal on which we hang the decision ahead of 19 July is one of delivering the vaccines, and we have a very high degree of confidence that we can deliver the vaccines that we think are needed in order to be able to take step 4 on 19 July.

I hope that was a clear and comprehensive answer, once I untangled myself from my initial response to my right hon. Friend.

[Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)]

Is not the problem with the two-week checkpoint that it creates another moment of hope for people who still feel even these restrictions very acutely, and that if we create hope and then shift the goalposts again, people will continue to deepen their despair? What will he say to those people?

[Matt Hancock]

No, because I think people understand that we are putting forward the moments by which we can and then will make assessments according to the data. We have done that throughout. I think people get that and they understood that ahead of 21 June. I think people are smart enough to understand that distinction.

After this four-week pause, we will be in a stronger position—because of the vaccination rollout that we have been discussing—to keep hospitalisations down, and so to live with this disease and take that final step on the road map.

Let me turn to the regulations themselves, which put the pause into effect by amending the expiry date of the Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (Steps) (England) Regulations 2021, so that they expire at midnight on the evening of 18 July. To reflect this change, we also need to align the dates on several other covid regulations that are essential for keeping us safe, including: the Health Protection (Coronavirus, Wearing of Face Coverings on Public Transport) (England) Regulations 2020; the Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (England) (No. 3) Regulations, which give powers to manage local outbreaks by cancelling events and closing individual premises; and the Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (Local Authority Enforcement Powers and Amendment) (England) Regulations 2020, which give local authorities powers to enforce covid-secure measures for businesses. They will all be extended until midnight on 18 July.

We do not want to extend these sets of regulations a day longer than we have to and have always said that we would ease restrictions as soon as we were able to safely to do so. Even though we have put forward these regulations to pause step 4, we are also putting forward regulations to ease restrictions in some areas, allowing us to remove the 30-person gathering limit for weddings, receptions and commemorative events—subject, of course, to social distancing measures—and to run another phase of our pilots for large events at higher capacity, including some, such as the Wimbledon finals, at full capacity. Even though we have not been able to take the full step 4 as we wanted, the regulations will allow us to make some cautious changes that will bring some joy to many people and move us slightly further down the road to recovery.

[Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con)]

Although the slight relaxing of things such as weddings is to be welcomed, certain other key life events have not been included. I am thinking of the likes of bar mitzvahs and baptisms, which mean so much to so many. Will my right hon. Friend look at those restrictions again, or even look at them at the two-week point, to see whether life events such as baptisms can be subject to reduced regulations?

[Matt Hancock]

I am happy to look at other life events, although not for the regulations that are before the House today, which are not open to amendment. I am happy to discuss other life events with my hon. Friend.

Let me turn to two other points before I close. First, let us look at the motion tabled by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House. The House has been determined to ensure that, even in the worst clutches of the pandemic, we have found a way that democracy can function and this House can perform its vital functions. Like everyone here, I miss the bustle and clamour of the Chamber when it is full. I cannot wait for the moment when we can all cram once more into our cockpit of democracy.

Just as we have extended other regulations, we propose extending the hybrid arrangements for the House until the House rises for summer recess on 22 July.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

Will the Secretary of State give way on that point?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, in a moment.

This will allow for proxy voting to continue along with virtual participation. Crucially, the regulations on the hybrid arrangements fall this summer recess, so when we return in September, we are confident that we can return in full, cheek by jowl once more. I do not know about you, Mr Deputy Speaker—nor, indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone)—but I cannot wait.

[Mr Bone]

I want to help my right hon. Friend. He cannot wait, so why wait? Why not make this House a pilot, to see what happens? We have the testing facilities, so let us make it a pilot. Say that now, Secretary of State.

[Matt Hancock]

I would dearly love that, and I will talk to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, who, as I well know, is an enthusiast. I would love it if we could make that so—let us see.

Finally, I want to tell the House about the results of our consultation on vaccination as a condition of deployment in care homes. After careful consultation, we have decided to take this proposal forward, to protect residents. The vast majority of staff in care homes are already vaccinated, but not all of them are. We know that the vaccine protects not only you, but those around you. Therefore we will be taking forward the measures to ensure the “mandation” as a condition of deployment for staff in care homes, and we will consult on the same approach in the NHS, in order to save lives and protect patients from disease.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

Will the Secretary of State then explain to the House whether visitors to care homes or to hospitals will also require proof of vaccination? Will delivery drivers require it? Will others who provide other services to those care homes and hospitals require the same? Is he not now walking down the road of requiring mandatory vaccination for almost everyone?

[Matt Hancock]

No, I do not agree with mandatory vaccination of the public, but for those who have a duty to care, in an environment that includes some of the most vulnerable people in the country, I think this is a sensible and reasonable step in order to save lives.

[Mr Harper]

The Secretary of State will also be aware that staff who provide domiciliary care in people’s homes—they potentially provide care to many people, going to many homes during the day—are also caring and present a similar challenge. It would be preferable, in the first instance, if we could get those vaccination rates up by education and persuasion. I am prepared, if that is not possible, and following the precedent we have in the NHS for those who perform operations and have to be vaccinated against hepatitis, to agree to this matter, but there is a real issue here with the millions of people who provide domiciliary care, who are often employed directly. How is that going to work and provide the level of protection required?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, we do propose to consult on this point, alongside the consultation on mandatory vaccination as a condition of deployment in the NHS. As my right hon. Friend rightly says, this is a complicated operational matter. The principle of vaccination for those in a caring responsibility is already embedded, as he says; there is a history going back more than a century of vaccination being required in certain circumstances. I think these are reasonable circumstances, so we will go ahead for those who work in care homes and we will consult about those in domiciliary care and those working in the NHS. However, I have no proposals for going, and would not expect us to go, any wider.

[Mr Steve Baker]

I can understand why we would want especially to protect people in those circumstances, of course, but will the Secretary of State explain why it is not possible to maintain their right to choose not to be vaccinated by instead, for example, requiring daily lateral flow tests for workers in those industries?

[Matt Hancock]

We already have significant testing, but this is a matter of risk and we know that the vaccine reduces that risk very significantly.

[Graham Stringer (Blackley and Broughton) (Lab)]

I will not be joining the Secretary of State in the Lobby later on, partly for civil liberties reasons, but I do agree with what he is saying about vaccination. About four years ago, the Science and Technology Committee looked at the level of flu vaccination in care homes, which at that time was about 20%. Flu, like covid, is a killer of elderly people. Will he be looking to make not only covid vaccination, but flu vaccination a condition of employment?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes we will, for exactly the reason that the hon. Gentleman sets out.

[Chris Bryant]

On someone proving that they are double vaccinated, there is still an issue between England and Wales and other parts of the UK. I wonder when that will be solved, because obviously everybody does not live in a hermetically sealed unit.

[Matt Hancock]

As somebody who grew up right on the Welsh border, I entirely understand that. I am working with Baroness Morgan, the new Health Minister in the Welsh Government, to ensure that we have the interoperability that the hon. Gentleman calls for. That is a significant piece of work that is under way. We need to sort this for vaccine data flows, and frankly all health data flows, across the border, and use this particularly acute need to change the policy and practices, to sort this out once and for all.

The regulations before the House today are there in order to pursue our goal, as throughout, to work to protect lives and get us out of the pandemic as soon as is safely possible. I commend the motion to the House.

Covid-19 Update

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Monday 14th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

Mr Speaker, these past six months, we have all been involved in a race between the vaccine and the virus. Our vaccination programme has been delivered at incredible pace: we have delivered 71 million doses into 41 million arms; and over 93% of people aged 40 and over have now received at least one dose. Because of this pace, we are able to open up vaccinations to those aged 23 and 24 tomorrow.

It is this protection that has allowed us to take the first three steps of our road map, meaning that right now we have one of the most open economies and societies in Europe. We have been able to remove the most burdensome of the restrictions and restore so many of the freedoms that we hold dear. At every stage, we have looked at the data, set against the four tests that the Prime Minister set out to this House in February. The fourth of those tests is that our assessment of the risk is not fundamentally changed by new variants of concern.

The delta variant now accounts for over 90% of cases across the country. We know that the delta variant spreads more easily and there is evidence that the risk of hospitalisation is higher than for the previously dominant alpha variant. Case numbers are rising, up 64% on last week in England, but the whole purpose of vaccination is to break the link between cases and hospitalisations and deaths. That link is clearly weaker than it once was. However, over the past week, we have seen hospitalisations start to rise; up by 50%. Thankfully, the number of deaths has not risen and remains very low.

Sadly, before the vaccine, we saw that a rise in hospitalisations inevitably led to a rise in deaths a couple of weeks later. The vaccine in changing that, but it is simply too early to know how effectively the link to deaths has been broken. We do know that, after a single dose of the vaccine, the effectiveness is lower against the delta variant, at around 33% reduction in symptomatic disease. However, the good news, confirmed with new data published today, is that two doses of the vaccine are just as effective against hospital admission with the delta variant compared with the alpha variant. In fact, once you have had two doses, the vaccines may be even slightly more effective against hospitalisation if you have caught the new delta variant. This gives me confidence that, while the protection comes more from the second dose, and so takes longer to reach, the protection we will get after that second jab is highly effective—and, if anything, slightly better—against the delta variant. So, for the purpose of the restrictions, while it will take us a little longer to build the full protection we need through the vaccine, all the science is telling us that we will get there. Of course, all this says that it is so important that everyone gets both doses when the call comes. Even today, I have had messages from people who have had their jab, and I am so grateful to each and every person for making our country safer. At every stage of the road map, we have taken the time to check it is safe to take the next step. Our task is to make sure the vaccine can get ahead in the race between the vaccine and the virus.

I know that so many people have been working so hard, making sacrifices, being cautious and careful, and doing their bit to help this country down the road map. I know that people have been planning and arranging important moments and that businesses have been gearing up to reopen. So it is with a heavy heart, and faced with this reality, that we have made the difficult decision not to move ahead with step 4 next week. Instead, we will pause for up to four weeks until 19 July, with a review of the data after two weeks. During this crucial time, we will be drawing on everything we know works when fighting this virus and will use the extra time to deliver the extra protection we need.

Despite the incredible uptake we have seen in this country, there are still people we need to protect: 1.3 million people who are over 50 and 4.5 million over-40s have had a first jab but not yet a second. The pause will save thousands of lives by allowing us to get the majority of these second jabs done before restrictions are eased further. We are today reducing the time from first to second jab for all people aged 40 and over from 12 weeks to eight weeks to accelerate the programme. If, like me, you are in your 40s and you have a second jab booked 12 weeks after your first, the NHS will be in touch to bring it forward, or you can rebook on the national booking service. Our aim is that around two thirds of all adults will have had both doses by 19 July. I can tell the House that we have been able to deliver the vaccine programme faster than planned, so we can bring forward the moment when we will have offered every adult a first dose of the vaccine to 19 July, too. In this race between the vaccine and the virus, we are giving the vaccine all the support we can.

We have always said that we will ease restrictions as soon as we are able safely to do so. Even though we cannot take step 4 on Monday, I am pleased that we are able carefully to ease restrictions in some areas. We are removing the 30-person gathering limit for weddings, receptions and commemorative events—subject, of course, to social distancing guidelines. I am very grateful for the work of the weddings taskforce on this relaxation. We will be running another phase of our pilots for large events at higher capacities, including some at full capacity, like the Wimbledon finals. We are easing rules in care homes, including removing the requirement for residents to isolate for 14 days after visits out, and we are allowing out-of-school settings to organise residential visits in bubbles of up to 30 children, in line with the current position for schools. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale West (Sir Graham Brady) for his work in this area.

Even though we have not been able to take the full step as we wanted, I know that these cautious changes will mean a lot to many people and move us a little bit closer to normal life. As we do this, we will keep giving people the support they need. We are extending our asymptomatic testing offer until the end of July. We have put in place one of the most extensive financial support packages in the world, and we will continue to deliver enhanced support for the worst-affected areas.

We have seen how this approach can work—for example, in Bolton. Cases in Bolton have fallen by almost a third over the past three weeks. Even as hospitalisations have risen across the north-west, in Bolton, they have fallen by more than half. Last week, we introduced enhanced support in Greater Manchester and Lancashire, and I can now tell the House that we are extending these extra measures—surge testing, cautious guidance and extra resources for vaccination—to Birmingham, Blackpool, Cheshire, including Warrington, and the Liverpool city region. We know from experience that this approach can work, but we need everyone to play their part, so I urge everyone in these areas to get tested and to come forward for the support that is on offer. When you get the call, get the jab and help keep us on the road to recovery.

Finally, none of this would be possible without our vaccine programme. Without the vaccine, faced with these rising cases and hospitalisations, the clinical recommendation would have been to go back towards lockdown. The Vaccines Taskforce is critical to the work to deliver supplies, the work on booster jabs and ensuring we are protected for the future. Dame Kate Bingham did a formidable job in melding the best possible team, and I would like to congratulate her and everyone else who was recognised in Her Majesty’s birthday honours this weekend. I am delighted to be able to tell the House that Sir Richard Sykes, one of Britain’s most acknowledged biochemists and industry leaders, has agreed to take up the position of chair of the VTF. Sir Richard brings to bear experience from leadership positions in both the public and the private sectors, and I am delighted to have him on board to lead the team in the next stage of this mission.

This race between the vaccines and the virus is not over yet. These difficult restrictions challenge our lives in so many ways, but they play a vital role in holding the virus back and protecting people while we get these jabs done. So let us all play our part to keep us safe from this dreadful disease. I commend this statement to the House.

[Mr Speaker]

Before I call Jonathan Ashworth, who has five minutes, I remind the public that this statement is being interpreted by the British sign language interpreter.

[Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab/Co-op)]

I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement. I congratulate Sir Richard Sykes on his new role and I thank Dame Kate Bingham.

Tonight’s announcement was both predictable and, sadly, predicted. Many of our constituents and local businesses will be deeply disappointed. Our constituents did what was asked of them. They queued up for vaccination. We praised them in this House. The Secretary of State shed tears on the news and boasted, “Cry freedom,” on the pages of The Spectator. Yet we are now in the grip of a delta wave that is spreading with speed, and our constituents face further restrictions.

The Prime Minister’s complacency allowed this variant to reach our shores. On 25 March, there were warnings of a new variant in India. It is reported that Ministers first learned that the delta variant was in the UK on 1 April. The Government red-listed Pakistan and Bangladesh on 9 April, but did not red-list India until 23 April, by which point 20,000 people had arrived from India. Our borders were as secure as a sieve, and all because the Prime Minister wanted a photo call with Prime Minister Modi. It is astonishing that these Ministers promised to take control of our borders and conspicuously failed to control our borders at the very moment it mattered most.

Not only did the Prime Minister open the back door to this variant; he failed to take measures to suppress it when he could. It has been growing in prevalence among school-age children, yet mandatory mask wearing has been abandoned in secondary schools, and the Secretary of State has never explained why, despite being repeatedly asked. We know that isolation is key to breaking transmission, yet, 16 months on, people are still not paid adequate financial recompense to isolate themselves. When asked at the Select Committee last week, he claimed that people would game the system. The only ones who gamed the system are the mates of Ministers, Tory donors, spivs and speculators who made a fortune supplying duff PPE.

The Secretary of State seeks support for extending restrictions by pointing to plans to go further on vaccination. We will support extending restrictions in the Lobby, but even after extending the doses that he has outlined, there will still be large proportions of the population left unprotected, having had one dose or none—exposed to a variant that, if left unchecked, could accelerate and double every week, putting us on track for tens of thousands of infections per day by the end of this period. That will mean more hospitalisations, more long covid, more disruption to schools and more opportunities for variants to emerge. Will the Prime Minister lift restrictions in those circumstances, as he appeared to promise tonight, or will infection rates and hospitalisations have to fall before he does so?

Vaccination will get us through this in the end, so what is the Secretary of State’s plan to bring down infections and to extend vaccination rates in hotspot areas? We have learned that in Leicester surge vaccination has been abandoned. In parts of the north-west—in Chorley, Mr Speaker, in Tameside, in Salford and in Wigan—the dose numbers have gone down. Has vaccination surging been abandoned in those hotspot areas?

Finally, we are likely to see more infections in the coming days, and we are likely to see more contacts of infected cases in the coming days. Will the Secretary of State finally give those people isolation support so that they can isolate and quarantine themselves from the rest of society?

The chief medical officer said tonight that we would be lifting restrictions if it were not for the delta variant. The Prime Minister should have moved at lightning speed to prevent the delta variant reaching our shores. Instead he dithered, and tonight he is responsible for this delay.

[Matt Hancock]

I think that in that response, we saw a lifting of the veil on the Opposition’s position. The right hon. Gentleman knows that he has supported the Government’s position for a very large part of the crisis. We will be grateful for their support in the Lobbies, and quite rightly, because the Labour party has clearly accepted the logic of the position.

However, the logic of the questions the right hon. Gentleman just raised moved towards a position of never escaping from restrictions. I want us to escape from restrictions, and the vaccine is the way for us to escape from restrictions. The truth is—it is not the easy thing to say, but it is the right thing to say—that in this country and around the world, covid-19 will be with us and we will have to learn to live with it in the same way that we have learned to live with other deadly diseases like flu. The vaccine will help us get to a state in this country in which we can manage it and live our normal lives. The logic that the right hon. Gentleman set out is one in which we never escape.

It was a logic based on flawed thinking about how things work in practice, because the right hon. Gentleman’s other argument was that this is all due to the Government not taking decisions on India, based on information that we did not have at the time. His argument is that he has now seen in the published data that there was a problem in India—too right! And as soon as we saw the data, we acted on it. The whole case that he set up was that on 2 April we should have acted, but on 2 April neither the original B1617 Indian variant strain, nor the B1617.2 delta strain, had yet been designated a variant under investigation or a variant of concern.

Captain Hindsight over there is arguing, “Never escape from restrictions, and base your logic and evidence on things that haven’t been recorded yet.” That is no way to run a pandemic. Instead, we will put the interests of the British public first. We will take a cautious and irreversible approach. We will take difficult decisions if they are necessary, but we will get this country back on the road to recovery.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee.

[Jeremy Hunt (South West Surrey) (Con)]

May I start by saying that I totally agree with your expression of disappointment, Mr Speaker, that in a parliamentary democracy Parliament heard about this news after the media, and much as I respect my right hon. Friend it should be the Prime Minister who is here this evening?

I happen to support these measures and the caution the Government are showing, but may I suggest to my right hon. Friend that one of the reasons for the disappointment many people feel is the use of words like “irreversible”? Tonight, Sir Patrick Vallance said that we will be living with covid for the rest of our lives. If there is a vaccine-busting variant that threatens another 100,000 lives, these measures will not be irreversible, and we have a duty to be completely honest with people about the bumpiness of the road ahead. So may I urge the Health Secretary to be as cautious with the language we use as he rightly is with NHS bed capacity?

[Matt Hancock]

The goal is that the steps in the road map are irreversible; that is the goal, and I am sure it is a goal that my right hon. Friend agrees with. We have demonstrated repeatedly during this crisis our willingness to take difficult decisions if they are necessary and if they are needed by the data, but it is also important to try to take steps when we can have a good degree of confidence that we will then be able to deliver that irreversible route, as opposed to moving faster than that, which might lead to a reversal. I hope that that explanation is one with which my right hon. Friend and indeed the House can concur in terms of what we mean when we say that we seek an irreversible approach to the road map.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP) [V]]

While hospitalisations and ICU admissions are, thankfully, not increasing as fast as covid cases, they are both rising significantly, so this delay was inevitable. According to Public Health England, the delta variant appears to be about 50% more infectious and reduces the protection against infection from one vaccine dose to just 33%. As a single dose is therefore less effective, by what date does the Secretary of State expect all adults to be fully vaccinated with both doses and would that not be a more appropriate time for the removal of all restrictions, rather than setting another arbitrary date when younger adults will not be fully protected?

So how did we end up here? Having ignored the Scottish Government policy of all arrivals undergoing hotel quarantine, the Secretary of State then delayed adding India to the UK’s red list at the same time as Pakistan and Bangladesh. He previously claimed it was because of greater positivity rates among travellers from Bangladesh and Pakistan but that is not borne out by the published data. Between 25 March and 7 April the test positivity of arrivals from India was 5.1%, lower than Pakistan at 6.2% but significantly higher than Bangladesh at 3.7%. Was the delay not just because the Prime Minister was still clinging to his plan for a trade visit to India? The whole point of border quarantine is to protect the UK from variants that might be more infectious or show resistance to vaccine-induced immunity, so having allowed the delta variant to enter and become the dominant strain in the UK, does the Secretary of State not recognise that the Government’s border strategy has failed?

[Matt Hancock]

I thought that the right hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) on the Opposition Front Bench was Captain Hindsight, but, seriously, this argument is completely divorced from reality. The data that the hon. Lady has just recommended to the House is data about what happened between 25 March and 7 April, and she complains about a decision the Government took on 2 April because we did not know of the data up to 7 April; so she brings to this House information from after a decision was taken and asks why it was not taken into account for that decision, and the answer is because it had not happened yet.

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

Virtually everybody in the most vulnerable category, which made up 95% of hospitalisations and deaths, is protected by both jabs, the vaccines work against all variants thus far, and the latest Office for National Statistics data estimate that eight in 10 of us have antibodies. So will my right hon. Friend tell the House precisely how much better these metrics need to be in order for full freedom to be restored?

[Matt Hancock]

Our goal is that, by 19 July, two thirds of adults—around two thirds—will be double vaccinated. The data published today shows that the protection from transmission of this disease from a single jab is quite a lot lower for the delta variant, but the protection from hospitalisation from both jabs is that bit higher. That means that we do have to take a bit more time to get the protection from the double dose, whereas previously the single dose got a very significant proportion of the protection, but it does mean that once we get there, we have confidence in the effectiveness of the jab at keeping this virus at bay.

[Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)]

Professor Chris Whitty’s slide earlier this evening was very clear: we were on track to ease all restrictions next week until the delta variant hit our shores and took off in the UK. Apart from the late decision to red list India, could the Secretary of State explain why it was that, on 19 April, he told this House that the delta variant was a variant of concern and there would be surge testing, yet it was not officially designated a variant of concern until 6 May? This is important because that is what unlocked the surge testing. Why was there a delay of 17 days, and what impact does he think this delay has had on the spread and therefore on today’s announcement?

[Matt Hancock]

I took action to tackle this variant before it was designated even as a variant under investigation, because I was worried about what was happening in India, so in a way the hon. Lady makes my point for me. On the delta variant, we acted before it was recommended as a variant of concern by the scientific process. In fact, I have kicked off a review of that process, because I think it is the process and the scientific advice that should advise me that a variant is of concern. But having looked at and seen the data in India, we took action even before it was recommended.

[Andrew Griffith (Arundel and South Downs) (Con) [V]]

The tremendous effort by the Secretary of State and his colleagues in delivering 71 million doses has clearly made a difference, and it is why we are not going backwards today. I have previously raised the cause of the wedding industry in Arundel and South Downs, so will he accept my thanks for saving summer for this vital sector, but would he kindly support the Culture Secretary to ensure a successful summer of motorsport?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, I work very closely with the Culture Secretary on making sure that these events pilots can go ahead. We are working very closely with F1. I am delighted that we will be able to see the Wimbledon finals go ahead, on a pilot basis, with 100% capacity. It is fantastic to see the crowds at Wembley. We are making progress, and these freedoms have returned. We are not yet able to make the full step 4, but we are making the progress that we can.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the Secretary of State for his statement. We can all understand the difficulties that have been presented for those who are waiting to get married, have put off their weddings and have lost deposits, and who have been holding on and hoping against hope that their special day will come. Does the Secretary of State not agree that the importance of a wedding celebration is equal at least to the importance of a football match or a summit, and that if there is to be a delay, consideration must be given to those getting married in July and August? Will the Secretary of State task a working group of experts to outline the safest way to allow these family events to take place, and then ensure that those decisions will be discussed with and conveyed to the Northern Ireland Health Minister?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes. The weddings taskforce has worked very hard on ensuring that there are covid-secure ways of progressing, including opening up weddings, removing the cap on numbers and doing this with social distancing. I hope that that will allow lots of the thousands of weddings planned over the coming weeks to happen in a way that is consistent with social distancing. I am very happy to talk to my opposite number in Northern Ireland, Robin Swann, who does an exemplary job. I know that he looks at these things very carefully, and I have no doubt we can have a conversation about that.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

Before I ask the Secretary of State my question, I should just say—as a former Government Chief Whip, it does not give me any great pleasure to do so—that I wholly associate myself with your remarks earlier, Mr Speaker. This statement should have been made to this House by the Prime Minister before it was made to the media. I hope that we do not see a recurrence of it and I wish you well in your meeting with him.

The Secretary of State has set out that it is not the Government’s policy to get to zero covid—indeed, that is not possible. Can he say whether it is the Government’s policy to maintain a low prevalence of this virus? If it is not, can he confirm the Prime Minister’s sentiments today that 19 July is a terminus date, and can he rule out bringing back restrictions in the autumn and winter when we see an inevitable rise in what is a respiratory virus?

[Matt Hancock]

Well, it is not inevitable—I do not think it is inevitable. It may happen, but it is not inevitable because we also have the planned booster programme to strengthen further the vaccination response. But it is absolutely clear, based on all the clinical advice that I have seen, that a goal of eradication of this virus is impossible. Indeed, there is one part of this country that tried it for a bit in the summer and found it to be impossible. Therefore, we must learn to live with this virus and we must learn how we can live our normal lives with this virus, so I reflect the Prime Minister’s words, which, of course, I concur with entirely, on 19 July. Our goal is to make sure that we get as much vaccination done between now and then—especially those second doses—to make sure that we can open up safely, even if there is a rise in cases, by protecting people from hospitalisation and especially from dying of this awful disease.

[Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab)]

This is a hammer blow to hospitality businesses, many of which are trading currently at a loss, and to the night-time economy, which has been preparing to reopen and now faces more uncertainty. Many of the financial support packages that the Secretary of State referred to—the furlough, the rent moratorium, the VAT and business rates support—are due either to end or to be reduced, and businesses are still racking up debts for which they need a solution. If businesses are going to stay closed, support has to continue for as long as the restrictions last, so what are the Government going to do to give extra support to businesses, many of which are in real danger of collapse?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, of course I understand the impact of this decision on the businesses that are affected—both those that were hoping to open but will stay required to be closed by law, like nightclubs, and those that can open but will find it harder to trade than they would otherwise. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has put in one of the most extensive sets of financial support in the world. Of course, the more affected a business is, the more it is able to draw down on that support—on things like furlough. Furlough continues until September, but there needs to be a step towards the restoration of normal economic life. Nevertheless, we are determined to support businesses, hence the degree of support that has been put in place—that was put in place at the Budget—not just to cover the period of the road map based on the “not before” dates, but to run further than that, in case there needed to be a delay of one of those “not before” dates, because the whole principle was that we take these steps based on data, not dates.

[Sir Graham Brady (Altrincham and Sale West) (Con)]

Can my right hon. Friend confirm that many of those who are going to hospital now with covid are staying in hospital for a far shorter period than was the case earlier in the pandemic? Will he break down those figures for us? Will he also publish figures showing the breakdown between those who present in hospital for other reasons but subsequently test positive and those presenting with covid?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, I am very happy to seek to publish all those data. The latter data, I think, are published already. On the former data, the best estimate I have is that the average length of stay for somebody in hospital owing to covid has fallen from 10 days to eight days, so it has fallen to a degree, but not a huge degree. That is partly because of treatments, but it is also partly because some of the people in hospital have had at least one dose of the vaccine, which is highly likely to have reduced the severity of the disease. In the 10 most affected hospital trusts, on average, the number of people going to hospital who have had both doses is under 20%. A further approximately 20% of people have had one dose. The remainder—the majority—are people who have not been vaccinated at all.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

May I first associate myself with your remarks, Mr Speaker, about the Government’s behaviour and their complete contempt for this House—for both sides of the Chamber?

On current rates, I understand that we are looking at something like 40,000 cases by the first week of July, according to the Secretary of State’s own Department’s data. That is on trend. What does that say about the Prime Minister’s decision not to put India on the red list when it clearly had twice the infection rate of Pakistan and Bangladesh? Was that not simply a very expensive photo opportunity that is going to cost Warwick and Leamington businesses and those across the country dear?

[Matt Hancock]

No, because any businessman or woman in Warwick or, indeed, Leamington will understand that it is literally impossible to take decisions on data that has not yet occurred. The hon. Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson) had it right when she pointed out that we did not know this data at the time.

[Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)]

As my right hon. Friend will be well aware, people in Keighley and Ilkley have never come out of some form of restrictions; in fact, in July last year, we went into some of the toughest local restrictions. Going forward, will he rule out using a regional approach, so that communities such as mine can come back out of this pandemic and recover as normal?

[Matt Hancock]

We have in the last month or so surged in testing and changed recommended advice, but we have not taken a regional approach to the legal restrictions. Frankly, I think that has been a better way of doing things. I know that that is what the people of Keighley would prefer, and they are very wise folk.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab) [V]]

Thank you for your remarks, Mr Speaker, both at the beginning of this session and to me personally. I am grateful.

It is axiomatic that the higher the rate of infection, the higher the rate of transmission. In this battle between the virus and the vaccine, the virus wins, with those high rates. The only antidote to that is, as we saw in Bolton, surge vaccination. Bolton now has the second highest rate of the Greater Manchester boroughs; we have been overtaken, alas, by Salford. That is why people across Greater Manchester do not understand why we do not have surge vaccination. Yes, it would be good for Greater Manchester, but it would be good for the whole country. Can the Secretary of State explain?

[Matt Hancock]

I would love to surge vaccinate the whole country. Supply is the rate-limiting factor; it has been from the start. To surge the whole country would be to go as fast as we can, which is what we are doing already. Yes, we can surge in relatively small areas. In the areas that need extra support, which now constitute about 10% of England, we are increasing testing where we have the spare capacity, especially of the lateral flow kits; we are putting in place the guidance to be more cautious; and we are putting in place the extra support we can give to get the vaccines out, especially to groups who are harder to reach. But we need to bring the whole country forward with the vaccination programme. That is why we are going as fast as we can, and I am delighted that we are able to bring forward the date by which we will have been able to offer all adults a dose from the end of July to 19 July as part of what we are able to announce today.

[Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend has taken the wedding industry up to the top of the hill and told them they can open up without restrictions, but marched them down again and said, “Only if you can socially distance.” Many wedding venues do not have huge rooms, so that is going to be very difficult. I am very concerned that the wedding industry, and the couples who want to get married are going to be incredibly disappointed by the announcement today. Is there no way that the Secretary of State can overrule that and allow them—with care, obviously—to go ahead with no restrictions so long as they are sensible, but without the fear of social distancing?

[Matt Hancock]

I of course understand why many in the wedding industry and many who are planning to get married in the next month would prefer to be able to do so without any of these rules at all. I do not want these rules either, but, unfortunately, we have a virus that is growing again. We have to take the extra time to allow the vaccines to come through, so the social distancing rules are staying in place right across the board. Carving them out for one very specific activity is something that we looked at, but that we found a very, very difficult decision to take for all sorts of reasons, legal and practical, and in terms of fairness to everybody right across the board in different circumstances.

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) [V]]

I wish to return to the question of surge vaccinations. Case rates in Salford are higher than they have been since mid-January. They are five times higher than the national average and they are doubling around every seven days. We need to get vaccines into arms as quickly as possible, but this week we only have 3,500 doses of Pfizer, and that is falling to 2,200 doses next week. Despite promises from the Secretary of State of enhanced support and some talk of surge vaccinations in hotspots such as Salford, that lack of doses of the Pfizer vaccine is the major barrier to getting everyone in Salford jabbed. Will the Secretary of State remove that barrier? Will he make sure that we get the supply of Pfizer and the flexibility to vaccinate all our over-18-year-olds?

[Matt Hancock]

I am afraid that my reply is the same as it was to the hon. Member for Rochdale (Sir Tony Lloyd), which is that supply is the rate-limiting factor.

[Barbara Keeley]

indicated dissent.

[Matt Hancock]

The hon. Lady shakes her head, but it is a matter of fact that supply has been the rate-limiting factor throughout. We will do everything we can to support vaccination using the doses that we have. As she well knows, the UK, thankfully, is right at the front of the global race to get vaccinated, and that is because we bought early in very large bulk. Of course, we have worked to make that supply as big as possible as fast as possible. We go as fast as we can, but we cannot go faster than we can.

[Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con) [V]]

Thank you for calling me, Mr Speaker, and for what you have said tonight as well.

Has my right hon. Friend not recognised that just a few weeks—or “a little longer” in the Prime Minister’s parlance—make the difference between survival or closure for some businesses? Will he recognise therefore that forcing businesses to remain closed for a further period without financial support being extended for the same period is unjust, unconscionable and unsupportable? Will he take that back to the Chancellor and the Prime Minister, please?

[Matt Hancock]

I happily will, but I urge my hon. Friend to see the financial support that is in place and continues to be in place, most of it through to September. It was extended over that period in case we had to make an extension to the road map, and while I fully understand the impact on business—of course I do—I also can see the impact on saving lives. The advice is that this change will save thousands of lives because the protection of the vaccine, especially against dying of covid, is very, very strong, but the vaccine coverage is not yet comprehensive, especially with those second doses, so we need to get that done.

[Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)]

Thank you for calling me, Mr Speaker. There are now huge differences in the vaccination rate between Britain’s poorest wards and Britain’s richest wards. In Heartlands ward in my constituency, we have sky-high infection rates but rock bottom vaccination rates, yet, as the Secretary of State knows, the ward is the home to Heartlands Hospital. Down the road, GPs told me this afternoon that there is no Pfizer left in their fridges. There is no certainty about when it is going to arrive, and they do not know how much they will get when it does come. We know that when we open mobile units there is a five-hour queue. We know that pharmacies are successful, but in Birmingham tonight, there are, at best, vaccines for just 10% of the population of 18 to 29-year-olds. Over the next 34 days, how many Pfizer doses will arrive in Britain’s second city? We cannot unlock until we unblock this pipeline.

[Matt Hancock]

Before making an intervention like that, the right hon. Gentleman should first thank the teams who have supplied so much vaccination to this country, acknowledge that we have gone faster than almost anywhere in the world and work with us—work with the West Midlands Mayor and work across Birmingham—to make sure that we get the testing done as well and that we get vaccination done wherever possible. The fact that the fridges ran out of Pfizer demonstrates that we are getting through this as fast as we can, but supply is the rate-limiting factor on vaccination—it always has been—and on that the team have done a pretty amazing job, and I support them to go as fast as they possibly can over the weeks to come. That is what we will get done.

[Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)]

Across our country, alarming numbers of people not only forecast that this extension would happen, but increasingly believe that they are never going to see true freedom again—freedom from these restrictions, which the Secretary of State has promised us. What more can he say about the conditions under which we will get to step 4, to reassure those people that this Government will actually set them free and indeed in due course set them free from all the paraphernalia of the management of this pandemic?

[Matt Hancock]

I want to get rid of all the restrictions that have been put in place to manage this pandemic, and we will get there. My hon. Friend will have noticed that the link we have explicitly made is to the rate of vaccination and getting the vaccines done over these four weeks to come. Of course it is my duty to recommend to the Prime Minister the actions I think are necessary to keep people safe—as a Health Secretary, that is my duty—but I am also a parliamentarian who represents constituents who want these restrictions removed as soon as safely possible. That is our goal, and this is a difficult balance. I think we have got the balance right, unfortunately, today—I say “unfortunately” because I wish it was easier. It is not, but we are able to make some progress and I very much hope we can make the full degree of progress that my hon. Friend wants to see in the not-too-distant future.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

I want to ask about the Test and Trace app, because this relates to freedom as well. As I understand it, the Government intend to keep the legislation in place on Test and Trace all the way through until next March. At the moment, tens of thousands of people every day are pinged by the app. The app does not tell them when the infection might possibly have taken place. I know of schools where four whole classes were sent home because a single teacher had been pinged over the weekend. I have known of construction businesses where every single person has had to be sent home. If we keep on doing this, particularly in some parts of the country where there are high levels of infection, we are going to have large parts of the economy constantly being closed down. I know that there are some measures in place, but the financial problems are still very difficult, especially for middle-class families. They may have the financial freedom but they still find it very difficult to stay in work and be able to do their work when the rules are all changing. If we really want freedom, we are going to have to turn this blunderbuss into something more precise, are we not?

[Matt Hancock]

Of course the purpose of the app is to identify people who have been in close contact with somebody who has tested positive and let them know that, and therefore ask them to self-isolate—that is what it is there for. The hon. Gentleman asks me to get more data so that it can be more targeted. He will know from last summer’s debate that the restrictions on the amount of data we can gather through that app are put in place by the companies rather than by us, so we cannot be more targeted. I am very happy to arrange a briefing for him on the details of that. But the goal is to ensure, in time, especially for those who have been vaccinated, that we follow through on the pilots we have done under which people who are contacts—not the “cases” themselves—are able to go into a testing regime, rather than having to isolate. There are pilots under way to check clinically that that works, and I look forward to seeing their results.

[Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend advise us about the demographics of those he believes are likely to be hospitalised? Today, Public Health England said that both the Pfizer and the AstraZeneca vaccines can cope as well with the India variant as the Kent variant. The Pfizer vaccine is 94% effective against hospital admission after one dose and 96% effective after two, while the AstraZeneca vaccine is 71% effective against hospitalisation with one dose and 92% effective after two. Who would be hospitalised to the extent that the NHS would be swamped? Will he promise us that our country will not be locked down because some individuals who could be immunised choose not to be?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes. Thankfully, the take-up rates are very high, so only a very small proportion of people have chosen not to come forward to get the jab when offered. My right hon. Friend makes an important point, which is that the state’s obligation to get the country out of this situation falls more heavily on ensuring that vaccinations are offered than that they are taken up. Our goal is to ensure that take-up is as high as possible but, given that we are not going for mandatory vaccination across the board, the commitment that we make is to offer, and there is an important distinction between the two, as my right hon. Friend draws out.

On the make-up of those hospitalised, the average age has fallen considerably since the vaccination programme started, which is probably in large part due to the fact that, of course, the older cohorts were vaccinated first. That also, on average, reduces the acuity of those in hospital and therefore helps to break the link between hospitalisations and deaths yet further. I hope that answers my right hon. Friend’s first point.

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op) [V]]

The Secretary of State will be aware of the evidence that women who contract covid during their pregnancies are twice as likely to experience a stillbirth or a premature birth. He will also know that the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation decided in May that it was not worth prioritising such patients for the vaccine because the “low infection rates” made the “absolute risk” to pregnant women “very small”. Given the data that has been presented today and the evidence of the high risk of infection rising throughout the country, will the Secretary of State now rethink that decision and ensure that all pregnant women, at any age, and especially those in their third trimester, are fast-tracked to have both doses of the vaccine, so that we can protect not just them but their unborn children from harm?

[Matt Hancock]

This is an issue I have discussed with my clinical advisers, because it is very sensitive. I am sure that the hon. Lady would join me in urging all pregnant women to come forward and discuss vaccination with their clinician, because that is important, and she set out some of the reasons why. Of course, we have opened up, from tomorrow, vaccination to all those aged 23 and over, so vaccination will soon be available to every adult, which means that questions of prioritisation will be for the past—other than the question of the vaccination of children, which is separate in many ways and an important question that we will address in the coming weeks.

To anybody who is pregnant, I say: as soon as you are eligible for a vaccine, please discuss it with your doctor, because for the vast majority of people who are pregnant the right thing to do is to get the jab as soon as possible and get both jabs as soon as is practicable. I think that is something on which the hon. Lady and I would agree.

[Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)]

Last week, the Secretary of State told me:

“Our goal…is not a covid-free world…the goal is to live with covid”.—[Official Report, 7 June 2021; Vol. 696, c. 678.]

Well, you could have fooled me, and many of our constituents. There is dismay out there tonight. The reopening of the wedding industry is not a meaningful reopening and I think it is cruel the way some are being misled. The Prime Minister and my right hon. Friend have been very clear today that 19 July is not a new “not before” date but an end to all this, so will the Secretary of State tell the country his assessment of risk and personal responsibility and whether he feels that as a country we remotely have that right at this time?

[Matt Hancock]

In a pandemic, the balance between risk and personal responsibility is different, because someone can affect somebody else in a life-threatening manner even without knowing it. If we go to the philosophy of this, the first duty—in fact, the legitimate duty—of the state for any liberal is to prevent harm by individuals to others. Unfortunately, in a pandemic that is what people do if they have the disease, especially asymptomatically—they could be harming others without even knowing it.

Once we have the offer of a vaccine to everybody, and once we have protected and mitigated the large part of that risk, we do need to move back to a world based on personal responsibility. That is right, and that is where we intend to go. I think that we have made steps already in that direction in steps 1, 2 and 3. This country is freer than almost any other in Europe in terms of our economy and of our society. That is partly because of the very rapid vaccination effort here, but I hope that my hon. Friend can take from that the direction we intend to go.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab) [V]]

We are in this position because of the delta variant, the spread of which the Government could have slowed by putting India on the red list earlier instead of waiting while the Prime Minister faffed around over his trade trip. By late March, Canada was warning of high levels of covid cases arriving from India. By early April, similar warnings were coming out of Hong Kong. By 7 April, hundreds of people were arriving here from India with covid, and half of them had new variants. Yet even when the Minister finally announced India was on the red list, he inexplicably waited another four days while many more people with the delta variant returned. So can he tell me why he is still refusing to publish the analysis and advice provided on India by the Joint Biosecurity Centre that the Select Committee has asked for? Please will he publish it now?

[Matt Hancock]

We published the data for the number of imported cases of B1617 and other variants at the time the decision was taken. That data was the data—including up to 7 April—on which we took the decision, which was announced on 19 April, but it does take that time to see the sequencing, because it operationally takes time. Since we have published that data, I have heard endless calls from those on the Opposition Benches, including from the right hon. Lady, that I should have acted on data that we could not see and that had not been gathered, and that is only a way to make a point if you do not care about the truth of what actually happened.

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con) [V]]

As the evictions ban comes to an end and rate relief ends, what reassurance can my right hon. Friend give businesses such as Fitskool in my constituency, which is still operating under restrictions, that this delay to full step 4 really is the last delay?

[Matt Hancock]

I understand entirely the point that my right hon. Friend is making in terms of these restrictions and the impact on businesses and, in particular, the link to those in rent arrears. That is something I have been discussing with the Communities Secretary, and I am very happy to meet her to discuss how in the short term we can ensure that businesses, such as the one in her constituency that she mentions, get the support they need.

[Tahir Ali (Birmingham, Hall Green) (Lab) [V]]

The Secretary of State refers to Captain Hindsight as cheap political point scoring to deflect from the seriousness of the debate. May I suggest that he refers to the cartoon character—much suited to his own Government—of Danger Mouse? Can the Secretary of State explain why India was included on the travel red list a full two weeks after countries with much lower rates of infection? This decision came almost immediately after the planned visit by the Prime Minister to India was cancelled. In my constituency of Birmingham, Hall Green, many residents believe that the decision to include Pakistan and Bangladesh as red list countries was politically motivated. To restore public confidence, can the Secretary of State indicate when countries such as Pakistan and Bangladesh will be removed from the red list and put on the amber list?

[Matt Hancock]

The hon. Gentleman refers to political point scoring, and then makes points that he knows are not supported by the facts. As I have said to this House before, when the decision was taken on the 2 April change to put Pakistan and Bangladesh on the red list, test positivity of travellers returning from Pakistan was 4.6%—three times the 1.6% positivity of returning travellers from India. Those are the facts—the basis on which the decision was taken. I am not quite sure, but I think the hon. Gentleman asked at the end of his question whether we can now take those countries off the red list and put them on to the amber list. I do not support that approach, because it is important to keep this country safe.

[Jackie Doyle-Price (Thurrock) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend will understand my dismay because, as we have discussed between ourselves, economic harm and the sustainability of businesses is a real concern of mine. I worry about the distress that this announcement has caused. Let me take one particular sector of international travel businesses: cruises. The cruise industry has been closed for international sailing for more than 15 months, and there really needs to be clarity if we are going to save the sector, which supports 90,000 jobs and is worth £10 billion a year to the British economy. I ask my right hon. Friend to really make it clear to the chief medical officer that the cruise industry needs its own road map to be able to embark on international travel again.

[Matt Hancock]

My hon. Friend makes a strong and important point. I get the impact on business—of course I do—and especially on international cruises. I am glad we were able to work with the cruise industry to get some domestic cruise trips going again, admittedly in a small way, essentially to pilot it. It is more difficult on an international front. I am very happy to work with her and my right hon. Friend the Transport Secretary on what more we can do.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green) [V]]

Does the Secretary of State feel any shame that the reason we need to delay the easing of restrictions is entirely down to the incompetence of his Government—not only the three-week delay in putting India on the red list, but the utter failure to supress the virus through basic infection control, tracing and effective isolation? This is the fourth time the Government have let the virus spread. That might be great news for Serco, whose profits are up today, but it is a disaster for everyone else.

Does the Secretary of State recognise that, to protect people at home, we also have to do much more to vaccinate people in poorer countries, both because it is a moral imperative but also so that we reduce the chance of new variants being imported here? Will he therefore adopt a jab-matching policy so that, for every single dose administered in the UK from now on, we donate another dose to COVAX, as well as scaling up the UK’s vaccine production? The UK’s pledge of 100 million doses includes only 5 million by the end of September, and that is too little, too late.

[Matt Hancock]

No, I do not agree with most of that. In particular, I think the hon. Lady and the whole House should welcome the Prime Minister’s announcement that we will be ensuring that when we have excess supplies —I stress when we have excess supplies—we will donate 100 million doses around the world. I am not going to do that before we have excess supplies because we want to make sure people are vaccinated here at home.

[Caroline Lucas]

indicated dissent.

[Matt Hancock]

The hon. Lady shakes her head, but my first duty is to protect people here in this country, while at the same time making sure that people get access around the world, as we have done, for instance, with the Oxford-AstraZeneca jab—half a billion jabs have been done around the world. That is my order of priorities; I am very, very clear about it. We will help the rest of the world to get vaccinated, but we also need to look out for and vaccinate the British population. As for the first half of the hon. Lady’s statement, it was completely wrong.

[Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con)]

My constituents in Newcastle-under-Lyme have done everything we have asked of them during this pandemic. They have stayed at home and protected the NHS, and then they went out and got vaccinated in huge numbers, so any sense that these restrictions are to protect those who chose not to get vaccinated will be seen by them and me as deeply unfair. Will the Secretary of State set out what assessment he or his scientific advisers have made of the extent to which these restrictions are required to protect those who chose not to get protected?

[Matt Hancock]

This change is emphatically not for the purpose of protecting those who have chosen not to get vaccinated. It is emphatically to ensure that we have the time to offer the jab—both first jabs to all adults and second jabs for those who have had their first. To go through the data on that, currently, 93% of over-40s have had their first jab, but there are still 4.5 million who have not yet had the second jab. We can get through the majority of those over the next four weeks. Then, of course, we have been able to bring forward the date by which we will have offered a first jab to everybody. This is about the ability of the people who want to come forward to get jabbed to do so, and that is what we will achieve by 19 July to that degree. I hope that we end up with an uptake of almost 100% by the end of this; the uptake figures have been absolutely astonishing, so we will keep offering, we will keep encouraging people to come forward and we will keep trying to make the system and the vaccines as accessible as possible, but the thing that is in the direct control of the Government—subject to supply, of course—is the offering of the jab, and that is the commitment that we have made by 19 July.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

The Secretary of State will know that the hospitality and tourism industry has probably been hit more than any other part of our economy throughout this period. One of the challenges at the moment is that the ongoing restrictions mean that hospitality and tourism businesses need more staff than normal in order to cater for fewer customers than normal. Is he aware that the biggest single issue raised with me by hospitality and tourism industry bosses in the lakes and the dales is a lack of staff? This lack of staff is largely caused by the Government’s new visa rules. Would he agree to get his Immigration Minister friend to sit down with me and, more importantly, hospitality and tourism leaders from Cumbria and other rural areas—and other parts of the country involved in tourism—to discuss an emergency way of getting that vital boost to our hospitality and tourism industry just now?

--- Later in debate ---

[Matt Hancock]

I am happy to raise that for the hon. Gentleman. I almost thought he was going to say, at the end of that, that he was glad that Britain now controls its own borders.

[Greg Clark (Tunbridge Wells) (Con)]

Young people have made big sacrifices during the pandemic and seen two years of their lives disrupted. Many students and school leavers will be leaving school and university between now and 19 July, so will the Secretary of State confirm that what he said in his statement about removing the 30-person limit on commemorative events will include graduation ceremonies and school-leaving parties in commercial venues? After all, school students in particular have been educated in bubbles with each other for months now, and it would add insult to injury if they were to be denied an opportunity to say farewell to each other.

[Matt Hancock]

I will ensure that the precise Cabinet Office guidance reaches my right hon. Friend’s mobile phone as soon as possible. I am now an hour and five minutes into this, and I am afraid I am going to have to get back to him on that one.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

I am sure, Mr Speaker, that the Secretary of State for Health heard what you said at the beginning of this statement. May I ask the Secretary of State how we got ourselves into this position? He has been very good at coming to the House and making statements on covid, but on the biggest, most important day, the press were given an embargoed statement at 3 o’clock and the Prime Minister had a big showy press conference at 6, yet he could not be bothered to turn up until 8.30. This is a clear breach of the ministerial code. How did it happen? Who thought it was a good idea, and who actually broke the ministerial code?

[Matt Hancock]

All I can say, Mr Speaker, is that I am here now answering questions and I am happy to stay for as long as you need me.

[Mr Speaker]

In that case, I call Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown.

[Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)]

Mr Speaker, this is an unexpected surprise, and I am sure it is for the Secretary of State as well. I am sure that he will be interested in my question. Ultimately, these decisions are a matter of judgment. Can he publish that data on the risk to the health service and the risk to individuals of death, as opposed to those on the social harm and the harm to businesses? Can he therefore tell us why this judgment has been made?

[Matt Hancock]

The best thing that I can point my hon. Friend to is the slides that were presented by the chief medical officer today. I will see whether there is anything further that we can publish, but as a general rule, we publish all the data on which these judgments are made. Central to the judgment today is the fact that we are seeing a rise in hospitalisations, especially over the past week, and especially among those who are unvaccinated or have just had a single jab. Those people are not largely those who are unvaccinated out of choice; it is those who are unvaccinated because they have not yet had the opportunity because they are younger.

Until about a week ago, hospitalisations were basically flat. We thought that the link might have been completely broken between cases and hospitalisations or that it might be a lag. Sadly, hospitalisations then started to rise. For deaths, we have not yet seen that rise, which I am very pleased about; hopefully they will never rise, in which case the future will be much easier. It may still be that there is an element of it that is a lag, and we will be looking out for that very carefully over the couple of weeks ahead, but nevertheless our goal is to get those vaccines done in the five weeks between now and 19 July in order to make sure that this country is safe. I will commit to publishing anything further that we can that underpinned the decision, but I can honestly say to my hon. Friend that most of it is already in the public domain.

[Chris Bryant]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I completely agree with every single word of your statement earlier, as I guess you knew I would. I want to ask, however, about the provisions for our business from next week. As you know, these things were all timed to change at the same time as the national situation, which has now been changed.

I presume that there will be a knock-on effect on parliamentary business: whether Select Committees will meet in hybrid form or virtually, how we will conduct our parliamentary business in the Chamber and the Division Lobbies, and so on. I know that some of that is your responsibility solely, Mr Speaker, but some of it is the responsibility of the Government and might need changes to the Standing Orders. I wonder whether you have had any notification from the Government that they intend to bring such changes forward or of when we will debate them, when we will ensure we get them right, whether there will be proper debate and whether there will be a business statement to tell us when all that will happen.

Oral Answers to Questions

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Bowie (West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine) (Con)]

What steps his Department is taking to support the Scottish Government in their response to the covid-19 outbreak.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

The UK Government work closely with the Scottish Government to provide a co-ordinated approach to the response to covid-19 for the benefit of people across Scotland and across the United Kingdom. For instance, the UK Government have provided the Scottish Government with £1.2 billion in Barnett funding in the 2021 Budget, procured more than 500 million vaccines for the whole of the UK and made sure that our testing programme reaches all parts of the UK. This is a partnership in which the people of Scotland benefit hugely from the reach and strength of the UK Government.

[Andrew Bowie]

It is becoming clear across the entire United Kingdom that our NHS is facing a huge challenge as we reopen society to deal with the thousands of procedures, treatments and operations that have been delayed due to lockdown. What steps is my right hon. Friend taking to ensure that the national health service in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland can work together as easily as possible, sharing resources and services to ensure that this truly national health service for our whole country will support delivery to support our constituents wherever in the United Kingdom they might live?

[Matt Hancock]

My hon. Friend is quite right. The NHS is one of Britain’s proudest achievements. It operates across the whole of Great Britain and co-operation is ingrained in the DNA of the NHS. I am absolutely determined, as the UK Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, to ensure that, wherever people live in this United Kingdom, they can access the very best of care. If a constituent of my hon. Friend’s in Aberdeenshire needs a treatment that is only available in England because it is so specialised, they should have absolutely every right to that treatment, in the same way that a constituent of mine in Suffolk or a constituent in north Wales should. We have one NHS across these islands, and it is one of the things of which this country is most proud.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP) [V]]

I am sure the Secretary of State is well aware that the Scottish NHS has been separate since 1948 and has been under direct Scottish Government control for the last 20 years, so there are actually four NHSs. Perhaps I can ask him about some of his decisions that have made it harder for the Scottish and other devolved Governments to fight covid. Last September, he refused to follow Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies advice for an urgent lockdown, and the six-week delay allowed the more infectious B117 Kent variant to emerge and spread across the UK, driving a second wave more deadly than the first. He has repeatedly claimed to follow the science, so can he explain why he did not follow scientific advice last September?

[Matt Hancock]

Just on this point, this attempt at division within the NHS is deeply regrettable. It is not what people want. It is not what people want in Scotland. It is not what people want anywhere across the country. The NHS is an institution we should all be very proud of. Of course it is managed locally—it is managed locally across parts of England and it is managed under the devolution settlement in Wales and Scotland, as are health services in Northern Ireland, and rightly so—but it ill behoves politicians to try to divide the NHS. It is a wonderful institution that should make us all proud to be British.

On the specific question that the hon. Lady asked, of course we are guided by the science and take all factors into consideration. These are difficult judgments based on uncertain data, and we make the best judgments that we can. That is still the process we are going through, in the same way that the Scottish National party Government in Scotland have recently opened up parts of the rules in terms of social distancing, despite the rise in cases.

We face a challenging decision ahead of 21 June, but that decision is made easier by—indeed, the decision to open up is only possible because of it—the UK vaccination effort. Today marks six months to the day since Margaret Keenan in Coventry was the first person in the world to receive a clinically validated vaccine—the same day as Scotland, the same day as Wales. Since then we have delivered—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. It is not a statement, but an answer that we require. I call Dr Philippa Whitford to ask her second question.

[Dr Whitford]

I think the Secretary of State would find that most people in Scotland were rather glad that their NHS did not come under the Health and Social Care Act 2012 fragmentation. Having ignored the Scottish Government’s call in February for all arrivals to undergo hotel quarantine, he then delayed adding India to the red list. This allowed the more infectious Delta variant, which one dose of the vaccine is less effective against, to enter and become dominant in the UK. Is he not concerned that, if he removes all social distancing completely in the near future, the variant will cause a covid surge among those who are not fully vaccinated?

[Matt Hancock]

As I was saying, Mr Speaker—

[Mr Speaker]

Maybe not.

[Matt Hancock]

Touché, Sir. In response to the hon. Lady’s question, I will say this. The opening up and the return of our freedoms is only possible because of the UK vaccination effort. In the six months to the day since we first vaccinated across these islands—yes, in Coventry, but also in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—we have delivered 68 million vaccines across the whole UK and saved thousands of lives, and the whole United Kingdom has been set fair on the road to recovery thanks to the UK Government’s vaccination effort. I am very grateful to everybody in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England who has played their part in delivering it. That shows the benefit of the United Kingdom Union saving lives and working together for everybody on these islands.

[Karl Turner (Kingston upon Hull East) (Lab)]

If he will publish a timetable for adult social care reforms.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

What recent assessment he has made of the progress of the construction of new hospitals.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

In October, the Prime Minister confirmed a £3.7 billion funding allocation over the next four years to support the delivery of 40 new hospitals by 2030, and I am delighted that that includes Kettering General Hospital. We have since confirmed that there will be 48 new hospitals built by 2030, and six of those projects are under way.

[Mr Bone]

I am delighted that one of the new Boris hospitals will be built on the site of Kettering General, starting with an accident and emergency department and with the whole hospital being finished by 2027. Unfortunately, there may well be a substantial delay to that because of red tape and bureaucracy. Will the Secretary of State use his great skills, bang some heads together, and get the pen-pushers and accountants to sort out the delay so that we can get on with this? Will he be kind enough to meet the three hon. Members who represent north Northamptonshire to discuss the issue?

[Matt Hancock]

Nothing gives me greater pleasure than making stuff happen, so I would be very happy to meet my hon. Friend and the nearby colleagues who represent the people served by Kettering General Hospital to make sure we can get this project moving as soon as we can.

[Mr Speaker]

You can rebuild Chorley hospital at the same time.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Jamie Wallis (Bridgend) (Con)]

If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

I can tell the House that today, working with local authorities, we are providing a strengthened package of support, based on what is working in Bolton, to help Greater Manchester and Lancashire to tackle the rise in the delta variant that we are seeing there. The support includes rapid response teams, putting in extra testing, military support and supervised in-school testing. I encourage everyone in Manchester and Lancashire to get the tests on offer. We know that this approach can work: we have seen it work in south London and in Bolton, stopping a rise in the number of cases. This is the next stage of tackling the pandemic in Manchester and Lancashire. It is of course vital that people in those areas, as everywhere else, come forward and get the jab as soon as they are eligible, because that is our way out of this pandemic together.

[Dr Wallis]

Currently, all primary care providers in Wales remain on amber alert, which means that many of my constituents in Bridgend are unable to access necessary services unless it is an emergency. Will my right hon. Friend explain how this situation compares to his Department’s strategy to provide catch-up services as we come out of lockdown?

[Matt Hancock]

It is very important that, across the country, the UK is open, the NHS is open and that people can come forward and get treatment if they need it. As my hon. Friend knows, I work closely with the delivery of the NHS in Wales. The NHS there is of course the responsibility of the devolved Administration, but I am happy to take up his concern with the new Welsh Minister for Health and Social Services to see what we can do.

[Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab/Co-op)]

We have seen reports today of how exhausted NHS staff are. The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said in the media this morning that he was not sure what more the Government could do to support NHS staff. Obviously, the Government could give them a pay rise, but will the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care also commit today to extending free hospital car parking for NHS staff beyond the pandemic?

[Matt Hancock]

Of course, we have made hospital car parking free for staff during the pandemic. That is one of the many, many things that we have put in place to support staff. Staff wellbeing support and mental health support have also been incredibly important, learning, as we have done, from the support that we give to others in public service who go through traumatic episodes. The right hon. Gentleman is quite right that there is a wide array of things that we need to do to support NHS staff on the frontline.

[Jonathan Ashworth]

I wanted a commitment to extend the relief of hospital car parking charges beyond the pandemic.

The Secretary of State knows that waiting lists are at 5 million and that 432,000 people are waiting beyond 12 months. Once we are through this pandemic, the priority must be to bring those waiting lists down, but he is about to embark on a reorganisation of the NHS with his integrated care legislation. Local boards permit the private sector to have a seat on them. Virgin Care has just been given a seat on the integrated care system in Bath and North Somerset. He once promised that there would be no privatisation on his watch, so will he instruct that ICS to remove Virgin Care from its board?

[Matt Hancock]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that integrating the health service with services provided by local authorities, such as social care, is absolutely critical, and I know that he supports those proposals that have come from the NHS. When it comes to delivering services in the NHS, what matters to patients is that they get high-quality services, for instance, to deal with the backlog, and what matters is getting those services as fast as we possibly can. People care much less about who provides the service than they do about the service getting delivered, and that is the approach that I take, too.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee.

[Jeremy Hunt (South West Surrey) (Con)]

Today, the Health and Social Care Committee published its report on NHS and social care staff burnout, which chronicles the emotional exhaustion and chronic fatigue felt by many frontline staff in the past year. Much support has been put in place; the 50,000 nurse target is welcome, the extra doctors and nurses hired during the pandemic extremely welcome, but still we have shortages in nearly every specialty, leading to a sense of despair. Will my right hon. Friend consider the recommendation that we make today that Health Education England should be given the statutory power to make independent workforce projections, rather as the Office for Budget Responsibility does for Budget forecasts, so that we can at least look doctors and nurses in the eye and say that we are training enough of them for the future?

[Matt Hancock]

I am very happy to work with the Select Committee on the forthcoming health and care Bill. The Committee has already had a huge amount of input into that Bill, and I am sure that, during its passage, we will be working together on making sure that this piece of legislation, which has cross-party support, can come through the House in the best possible state. I am very happy to look at the specific proposal, but what I would say is that we have been recruiting record numbers of doctors and nurses to try to make sure that the NHS is always there for all of our constituents and their families.

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

The British Medical Association has warned that the freezing of the lifetime and annual pensions tax allowance until April 2026 could significantly impact the retention and overtime of health and care staff, with 72% of doctors that it surveyed saying that it would make them more likely to retire early. What consideration has been given to the BMA’s proposal of offering a tax unregistered scheme, similar to that of the judiciary, for those in the NHS?

[Matt Hancock]

We made very significant progress on this in the Budget immediately following the general election, as the hon. Lady will know. That has removed this problem for the vast majority of doctors who serve in the NHS. I am very glad that we were able to make that progress. I am always happy to look at suggestions from the unions and others, but I am glad to say that we have made a good deal of progress on this one.

[Mark Eastwood (Dewsbury) (Con)]

Despite the recent rise in infection rates, covid-related deaths and hospital admissions remain low across my constituency. Surge vaccinations and testing have been effectively rolled out in high-risk areas, and pop-up vaccination centres, such as the Darby and Joan Club in Clayton West, are doing a fantastic job. Given that, can my right hon. Friend assure the people of Dewsbury, Mirfield, Kirkburton and Denby Dale that there will be no need to introduce local restrictions in the future?

[Mr Virendra Sharma (Ealing, Southall) (Lab) [V]]

My constituents continue to be concerned that covid-19 is being used as an excuse to remove services from Ealing Hospital permanently. Accepting temporary suspensions for covid-19 is fine, but will the Secretary of State confirm that this public health crisis will not be used as an excuse to scrap services without following proper consultations and undertaking rigorous impact assessments?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes.

[Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)]

The Airedale General Hospital celebrates its 51st birthday this year, despite having a life expectancy of 30 years when it was originally built and 83% of it being built from aerated concrete, which is known for its structural deficiencies. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is well aware of my campaign to get a rebuild of the Airedale hospital, so that we can mitigate the risk of those structural deficiencies. Will he visit the hospital to meet me and Brendan Brown, the chief executive, so that we may discuss the plans in more detail?

[Mr Speaker]

I think the answer is yes.

[Matt Hancock]

Mr Speaker, not only has my hon. Friend made a compelling case for me to visit, but you have just told me to visit, so I have my marching orders. I look forward to my now forthcoming visit to Airedale hospital. I have not been yet, so I am very keen to come.

The Minister of State responsible for the hospital building programme has been heavily involved, and I have been looking at the paperwork. As my hon. Friend knows, on top of the 40 hospitals we announced—six of which are already being built—we have eight further slots to come, and Airedale hospital is very much on my radar for those slots. We will run an open competition and will make sure it is fair, but I will certainly visit.

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op) [V]]

This week, the Prime Minister praised the major benefits of the private finance initiative companies that are part of the LIFT—NHS Local Finance Investment Trust—initiative running GP services. That is why I am sure that the Secretary of State will be disappointed to learn that here in Walthamstow, Community Health Partnerships, a PFI LIFT company that we estimate has made several millions of pounds of profit from the deal on top of its service charges, and which the Secretary of State is ultimately in charge of, has just handed our local toy library a business rates bill of £30,000 for during the pandemic. I hate to add to the Secretary of State’s busy diary, but will he meet me to discuss what we can do to ensure that such companies stop making major profits from our NHS services and that benefits such as a toy library are not lost due to their antics?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, I will ensure that the Minister of State takes a meeting with the hon. Lady.

[Nickie Aiken (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)]

I am sure that my right hon. Friend saw Fergus Walsh’s report on the BBC news last week on spinal muscular atrophy and the importance of the UK’s newborn screening programme. Surprisingly, the UK screens for only nine rare diseases in the heel-prick test, compared with other European countries such as Iceland and Italy, which test for 47 and 43 diseases, respectively. The sooner the diagnosis for a child with a rare disease the better, because it can change their life and their life chances. With that in mind, does my right hon. Friend agree that the UK should now consider expansion of the newborn screening programme? Will he meet, or ask a Minister of State to meet, me and campaigners on the issue?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, absolutely, I 100% agree with my hon. Friend. We have the funding to expand that programme. She will have seen in our national genomics healthcare strategy that newborn screening is specifically highlighted. It is a personal mission of mine to make that happen. I am happy to meet her and Baroness Blackwood, the chair of Genomics England, who has been driving the project forward.

[Abena Oppong-Asare (Erith and Thamesmead) (Lab)]

Early diagnosis gives the best chance of survival, but a GP in my constituency has expressed serious concerns about delays in accessing urgent blood tests, which are critical to diagnose cancer. Will the Secretary of State ensure that local issues such as this do not worsen the already significant cancer backlog and put more people’s lives at risk?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes. The hon. Lady raises a very important issue, and if she writes to me with the full details, we will get right on it.

[Caroline Ansell (Eastbourne) (Con) [V]]

I am delighted to report back to my right hon. Friend that the University of Brighton, which has a campus in Eastbourne, has experienced a significant rise in the number of applications to study for careers in health professions. A shortage of training placements is the only real brake on the numbers of would-be students. I understand from having talked to the university that in the UK students must complete over 2,000 hours in placement. That is in contrast to Australia’s and New Zealand’s 1,000 hours. Is that seemingly high requirement under review with Health Education England so that we do not miss an opportunity to capture this new interest, build the NHS workforce of the future, open opportunities to all those who have the talent to succeed, and further secure my home town as a destination for studying?

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Many constituents have con, deeply concerned by Government proposals to grab, store and share GP health data. Can the Secretary of State tell me this: if I opt out of this data grab, will my health data be available to a hospital outside my home area should I have an accident, for example? If I do not opt out of it, how can I control how my data is shared, whether individually or in aggregate? I do not want to have to choose between privacy and my health.

[Matt Hancock]

The hon. Lady is quite right, and if she was in the Chamber earlier, she would have heard the Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill), say that we are going to delay the deadline for this programme, including the opt-out, which is currently scheduled to end on 23 June. That has already been welcomed, while we have been in here, by the Royal College of General Practitioners and the British Medical Association, and then we will work through these issues. Everybody agrees that data saves lives. We have to make progress in this area, and it is very important that we do it in a way that brings people with us and resolves exactly the sorts of issues that she raises.

[Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)]

Although covid cases remain above the national average across Kirklees, thankfully hospitalisations and deaths remain low. Locally, my constituents are getting vaccinated and tested. Can the Health Secretary please confirm that he will not reintroduce local restrictions?

[Matt Hancock]

I am really glad to say that in Bolton and other parts of the country where we have sent in a big package of support, including surge testing—as we have done in Kirklees—we have seen a capping-out of the increase in rates without a local lockdown thanks to the enthusiasm of people locally and, of course, the vaccination programme. That is our goal. Our goal is that England moves together. That is what we are putting these programmes in place to do, and we are seeing them work.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Northwick Park Hospital, which serves my constituents, was the first to be hard hit by covid last year. At the height of the second wave in January, its remarkable staff were looking after some 600 patients. It needs investment in intensive care and recovery services. When Ministers receive the business case, can I ask them to look particularly sympathetically at it?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes.

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

Macmillan estimates that the current backlog of people awaiting a first cancer treatment across England stands at 39,000 people. What plans can my right hon. Friend outline to bolster cancer services so that those people get the treatment they need?

[Matt Hancock]

Recovering the backlog that has been caused by the pandemic is a huge task for the NHS, and was raised by the right hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) from the Opposition Front Bench, quite rightly. The backlog has unfortunately been increased as a consequence of the pandemic. We have put in extra money—an extra £1 billion this year—and we are seeing cancer services running at 100% of their pre-pandemic levels, and in some cases above 100%, in order to get through the backlog. The most important thing for the public watching this and for my hon. Friend’s constituents is to make sure the message gets out loud and clear that the NHS is open, and that if they have a problem, they should please come forward.

[Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (Ind)]

Diolch, Mr Speaker. What recent discussions has the Secretary of State had with the Home Office regarding the successful clinical trials in the use of psilocybin in helping to deal with depression? It is a natural chemical found in fungi.

[Matt Hancock]

That is not something that has yet come across my desk, but I will make sure that the relevant Minister writes to the hon. Gentleman with as much detail as we know.

[Paul Maynard (Blackpool North and Cleveleys) (Con)]

Community defibrillators are vital potential life savers, and many community groups fund investment in them. However, it is concerning to hear that members of the public are denied access to defibrillators when they are on private land. What can Ministers do to ensure that access is presumed rather than subject to permission?

[Matt Hancock]

What my hon. Friend says is absolutely right. Of course if someone puts a defibrillator on private land, access to it should naturally be open to anybody who needs it. I will look into the exact legal status, but let us set aside the legal status for a minute. If there is a defibrillator on private land that could save somebody’s life, the landowner should of course allow access to it for anybody who needs it.

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

As current Government investment in motor neurone research is not the targeted funding that is needed, will the Minister meet charities, researchers and patients to examine this discrepancy and commit to additional funding of £10 million a year for five years for a virtual motor neurone disease research institute, with a specific focus on helping us to get a world free of MND?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

Mr Speaker, I am very grateful that you could fit me in at the end.

Yesterday during the statement the Secretary of State did not have the information to hand on the efficacy of the covid vaccines in reducing serious disease and hospitalisation. He made a commitment, rightly, to set them out today at Health questions at the Dispatch Box; and I am delighted, with this question, to give him the opportunity to do so.

[Matt Hancock]

First, I can say that a single dose of the Pfizer or AstraZeneca jab offers protection of 75% to 85% against hospitalisation, while data on two doses, which is currently available only for Pfizer, indicates 90% to 95% effectiveness against hospitalisation and 95% to 99% effectiveness at preventing death. However, my right hon. Friend also asked specifically about the delta variant, and I said that I did not have the figure in my head for the reduction in hospitalisations. I do not know whether I should be glad, but I can report to him that the reason is that there is not yet a conclusive figure. This morning I spoke to Dr Mary Ramsay, who runs this research at Public Health England, and she told me that the figure is currently being worked on. The analysis is being done scientifically and should be available in the coming couple of weeks. This is obviously an absolutely critical figure and I will report it to the House as soon as we have it.

[Mr Speaker]

I will now suspend the House for a few minutes to enable the necessary arrangements to be made for the next business.

Covid-19 Update

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

I would like to update the House on our work to beat this pandemic and to make sure that the world is prepared for the pandemics of the future.

Tomorrow, we mark six months since the world began vaccinating against covid-19 at Coventry Hospital. In that time, we have vaccinated over 40 million people here in the UK, and 2 billion doses have been delivered across the globe. As of today, 76% of UK adults have been vaccinated at least once, and 52% of adults have had two jabs. The pace of the vaccine roll-out has been extraordinary. This Saturday alone, the team delivered over 675,000 jabs, and I am delighted to be able to tell the House that, from this week, we will start offering vaccinations to people under 30, bringing us ever closer to the goal of offering a vaccine to all adults in the UK by the end of next month.

From tomorrow morning, we will open up vaccination to people aged 25 to 29. Over the remainder of this week, the NHS will send texts to people in those age groups, and, of course, GPs will be inviting people on their list to come forward. I am sure we have all been cheered by the images we have seen of so many eligible young people coming forward and lining up to get the jab, showing that the enthusiasm for the jab is not just the preserve of older generations. The people of this country know what it takes to keep themselves and the people around them safe. The latest estimates indicate that the vaccination programme has averted over 39,000 hospitalisations and over 13,000 deaths. So the vaccination brings us hope, and I am sure the whole House will join me in thanking people for their perseverance and patience as they have waited for their turn.

For all that great progress, there is no room for complacency. The delta variant, first identified in India, has made the race between the virus and the vaccination effort tighter. Although the size of the delta variant’s growth advantage is unclear, the recent best scientific estimate is of an advantage of at least 40% over the previously dominant alpha variant—the so-called Kent variant. The delta variant now makes up the vast majority of all new infections in this country.

Over the past week, we have seen case rates rise, particularly in the north-west of England, but we know also that our surge testing system can help hold this growth. In Bolton, case rates over the past fortnight have been falling. We have expanded the approach taken in Bolton to other areas, and we will roll it out to other areas as necessary. I encourage everybody in those areas to get the tests on offer, no matter where they live. Regular tests can help to keep us all safe, and we know that the test, trace and isolate system has a vital role to play in keeping this all under control.

Of course, the most important tool we have is that vaccination programme. We know that the vaccine is breaking the link between infections, hospitalisations and deaths—a link that was rock-solid back in the autumn. Despite the rise in cases, hospitalisations have been broadly flat. The majority of people in hospital with covid appear not to have had a vaccine at all. I want to update the House on some new information that we have on this. As of 3 June, our data show that of the 12,383 cases of the delta variant, 464 people went on to present at emergency care and 126 were admitted to hospital. Of those 126 people, 83 were unvaccinated, 28 had received one dose and just three had received both doses of vaccine. We should all be reassured by that, because it shows that those vaccinated groups, who previously made up the vast majority of hospitalisations, are now in the minority. So the jabs are working, and we have to keep coming forward to get them. That includes, vitally, that second jab, which we know gives better protection against the delta variant.

The confidence in our jabs comes from the fact that they are working and the knowledge that they are the best way out of the pandemic. No one wants our freedoms to be restricted a single day longer than is necessary. I know the impact that these restrictions have on the things we love, on our businesses and on our mental health. It is still too early to make decisions on step 4. The road map has always been guided by the data and, as before, we need four weeks between steps to see the latest data and a further week, to give notice of our decision. So we will assess the data and announce the outcome a week today, on 14 June.

I know that these restrictions have not been easy. With our vaccine programme moving at such pace, I am confident that one day soon freedom will return. To do this, we must stay vigilant, especially at this time when schoolchildren are returning to classrooms after the half-term break and when we are seeing the highest rises in positive cases among secondary school-aged children. With schools returning today, it is vital that every secondary school-aged child takes a test twice a week to protect them, to help keep schools open and to stop transmission. That is crucial to stop the spread and to protect the education of their peers. While the evidence shows that the impact of covid on children is usually minimal, we also know that there is higher transmissibility among children, so the message to all parents of secondary school-aged children is: please get your child tested twice a week to help keep the pandemic under control and to help on the road to recovery.

The House will also be aware that our independent medicines regulator, the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, has conducted a review of the clinical trial data for the Pfizer-BioNTech jab. Having already concluded that the vaccine is safe and effective for people over the age of 16, it has also now concluded that the jab is safe and effective for children aged between 12 and 15 years old, with the benefits of vaccination clearly outweighing any risks. I can confirm to the House that I have asked the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, the committee that advises us on immunisations, to come forward with clinical advice on vaccinating 12 to 17-year-olds, and we will listen to that clinical advice, just as we have done throughout the pandemic.

People in this country know that vaccines are the way out, but this pandemic will not be over until it is over everywhere. This week, the Prime Minister will host G7 leaders in Cornwall, where he will work to persuade our allies to join the UK in our historic commitment to vaccinate the whole world against covid-19 by the end of 2022. The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine has already proved to be a vital tool in this effort, with more than half a billion doses now released for supply around the world and, crucially, delivered at cost. In my view, this approach—providing vaccines at cost—is the best way to vaccinate the world. Developing a vaccine and allowing countries to manufacture it at cost is the greatest gift that this nation could have given the world during the pandemic.

In Oxford, ahead of this week’s G7 leaders summit, I met G7 Health Ministers and guests from some of the world’s largest democracies. Our new clinical trials charter, agreed in Oxford, will help end unnecessary duplication of clinical trials and ensure greater collaboration across borders, resulting in faster access to approve treatments and vaccines. We reached agreement with industry leaders to cut to just 100 days the time that it takes to develop and deploy new diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines. As a result of what we have agreed in Oxford, there will be people who will live who otherwise might have died, and I can think of no greater outcome than that.

In summary, beating this pandemic is not only an international imperative, but a domestic duty that falls on each one of us. We must keep up the basics, such as hands, face, space and fresh air, get regular tests and, of course, when we get the call, get both jabs, because that is the way that we can stop the spread and get out of this and restore the freedoms that we hold dear safely and together. I commend this statement to the House.

[Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement. I am also grateful that he has confirmed that the Government’s approach continues to be driven by the data, not by dates. We face some uncertainty, as we often have done throughout the past 15 months, but we do know that the delta variant is now the dominant variant in the UK. We know that 73% of delta cases are in unvaccinated people. We know that one dose offers less protection against this particular variant, and we know that, although hospitalisations are low, an increase in hospitalisations will put significant pressures on the NHS as it tries to deal with the care backlog. We also know, of course, that long covid is significant and debilitating for many people.

I am an optimist and I strongly believe that, ultimately, vaccination is our way through this. Can the Secretary of State go further on vaccination? Is he able to do more to drive up vaccination rates in those areas that have seen the delta variant take off and where uptake remains low, such as Blackburn or my own city of Leicester? Can he narrow the timeframe between the first and second dose, given that we know that one dose is not as protective as we would like? We have seen that Wales will be vaccinating everyone over 18 from next week. Can he tell us when England will follow?

Yesterday, the Secretary of State talked about the outbreaks among schoolchildren and young people. We know that children can transmit the virus and that children can be at particular risk of long covid. In that context, may I ask again why mask wearing is no longer mandatory in secondary schools? I am pleased that he has asked the JCVI to look at vaccination for children; it is something that I have I pressed him on a number of times at the Dispatch Box. Can he give us a timeframe on when he expects the JCVI to report on that front?

The Secretary of State talks about the G7. The pandemic has certainly shown that in an interconnected world where climate change and biodiversity loss drive zoonotic spillovers, working internationally to prevent future outbreaks is in our interests. None of us is safe until all of us are safe. That is not a slogan; it is the fact of the situation that we are in. That means working internationally. For a start, it means not cutting international aid, but it also means working globally on our vaccination efforts. He will have seen today that Gordon Brown, Tony Blair and other ex-world leaders have put forward a G7 burden sharing plan that would vaccinate the world. Will the Government support it?

Finally, I welcome what the Secretary of State said about research. Research and science are our way through this pandemic, and our way through to curing so many other diseases and ailments. However, he will know that while we are in this pandemic—while GPs and frontline staff are stretched—patients are unaware that a whole load of GP-held patient data is about to be transferred to NHS Digital.

Now, I am not opposed to NHS data being used for public good research, but some of the most sensitive personal data shared with GPs by patients in confidence several years ago—potentially when in a state of vulnerability, such as termination of pregnancy, matters of domestic or sexual abuse and issues of substance misuse or alcohol abuse—is set to be shared with NHS Digital and potentially to be used by commercial interests, and yet hardly anyone knows about it. There are worries about safeguards and patient confidentiality. Given the secrecy, the haste and the difficulties in opting out, will the Secretary of State now consider abandoning this plan, pausing it for now and launching a transparent consultation process with patients and clinicians on how confidential data can best be shared for research purposes?

[Matt Hancock]

First, the right hon. Gentleman raised the question of ensuring that we reduce transmission among children. It is true that the increase in case rates has predominantly been among children, especially secondary school-aged children. The testing regime among secondary school-aged children has been enthusiastically taken up by schools across the country. It is very important, as we return from half-term, that that is reinstated in full—that every child is being tested twice a week. It made a big difference in helping to keep schools open. If somebody tested positive at home before they went in, it meant that the whole bubble did not have to go home. It also prevented transmission up to older people, who might be more badly affected. Testing in schools is incredibly important to ensure that we can keep as much education as possible between now and the summer.

The right hon. Gentleman asked about the JCVI advice on children’s vaccination that will be available in a matter of weeks. I know that the JCVI is working hard on it now. I will of course come to the House, Mr Speaker, to explain the proposed approach as soon as we have that formal advice.

Finally, the right hon. Gentleman asked about the use of patient data. I am glad that he said how important he thought research based on data is within the NHS, because it is life-saving. It has been used incredibly powerfully during the pandemic. In fact, one of the reasons why the UK is the place where we discovered some of the life-saving treatments for covid, such as dexamethasone, is the powerful use of data. Just that discovery of dexamethasone, which happened through the use of NHS data, has saved over 1 million lives around the world.

The right hon. Gentleman raised the issue of data, which he said belonged to GPs, being passed to NHS Digital. The truth is that data about his, my or anybody else’s medical condition does not belong to any GP; it belongs, rightly, to the citizen—the patient. That is the approach that we should take. I absolutely agree that it is important to do these things right and properly, but I am also very glad that the vast majority of people are strongly on side for the use of their data to improve lives and save lives. That is the approach that we are going to take in building a modern data platform for the NHS, so that we can ensure that we use this modern asset to improve individuals’ care and to improve research and therefore all our care, while of course preserving the highest standards of safety and privacy, which will be enhanced by a more modern use of data. I am glad that he is on side for the use of data in the NHS, but you have to be on side when that is actually put into practice. It is not just warm words; it is about making it happen.

[Jeremy Hunt (South West Surrey) (Con)]

It is incredibly encouraging that just three out of 12,000 cases of the delta variant were double-jabbed, but is the debate inside Government now about a potential short, temporary extension of the restrictions to allow more people to get both jabs or a more permanent slowing down of the easing of restrictions? That is a massive difference to all our constituents in terms of what may happen following the announcement next week.

Secondly, could the Secretary of State look at one particular group who have been very hard hit over the last year: the parents of disabled children? He will know about my constituent Laura Wilde, who took her nine-year-old daughter, who has cerebral palsy, to Lanzarote for physio that she was unable to get in England and is looking for flexibility in the quarantine rules when she comes back. Can we show more flexibility in exceptional cases such as that?

[Matt Hancock]

On the latter point, I am very happy to look at how the case of my right hon. Friend’s constituent Laura Wilde can fit with the exemptions that already apply for travel for medical purposes, along with the testing regime, to ensure that that is done in a safe way. I am happy to talk to colleagues at the Home Office about allowing that to happen.

On my right hon. Friend’s first point, it is reassuring that there is such a clear breakage of the previously inexorable link from cases through to hospitalisations. That is very good news, and it is why we have this race to get everybody vaccinated as soon as possible. If I can address those people in their late 20s who will be able to book a jab from tomorrow and others who might feel that, in their age group, they are unlikely to die of covid, the honest truth is that the best way for us to get our freedoms back and get back to normal is for everybody to come forward and get the jab. It really matters that we all come forward and do this, because that is the safest way out.

On my right hon. Friend’s specific question about our thinking on the 21 June step 4, not before date, the honest answer, which I will give to any question about this, is that it is too early to say. I tried to give a studiously neutral answer on the TV yesterday, which some people interpreted as gung-ho and others interpreted as overly restrictive. That is the nature of uncertainty, I am afraid. It is too early to say. We are looking at all the data, and the road map sets out the approach that we will take, which is that there is step 4 and then there are four distinct pieces of work, which are reports on what should happen after step 4 on social distancing, international travel, certification and the rest. We will assiduously follow the road map process that has been set out with the five-week gap—four weeks to accumulate the data, then taking a decision with a week to go. The Prime Minister will ultimately make those decisions and announce them in a week’s time.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP) [V]]

I note that the Secretary of State is still considering ending all social distancing measures on 21 June, but does he not think that that would be dangerous in the face of rising cases of the significantly more infectious delta variant? Would it not be better to adhere to the Government’s mantra of being guided by data and not dates?

While it is welcome that half of adults are fully vaccinated, and Scotland has already started vaccinating those over 18, the Secretary of State must be aware that one dose of the current vaccines only provides 33% protection. Does he accept that that means we cannot rely on single dose vaccination to control this variant without social distancing measures? I and many other MPs repeatedly called for hotel quarantine to be applied to all arrivals in the UK to prevent exactly the situation we now face. He repeatedly claimed that home quarantine was working, but does he not accept that the importation and now dominance of the delta variant shows that is not true? With the current rise in cases of the delta variant threatening the progress made during almost five months of lockdown, does he regret the decision to delay adding India to the red list?

In light of the disruption caused by the shambles of changing Portugal’s classification this week, does the Secretary of State recognise that it has done neither holidaymakers nor the travel industry any favours? Will he now get rid of the traffic light system and tighten border quarantine policy so that we can avoid importing more vaccine-resistant variants and safely open up our domestic economy and society?

The Secretary of State talked today about the UK vaccinating the world, so can he say how many doses the UK has donated to COVAX? Does that mean the Government will support the sharing of intellectual property and technology and the trade-related intellectual property rights—or TRIPS—waiver so as to increase global vaccine production?

[Matt Hancock]

There is quite a lot that needs sorting in that. The first thing I would say is that the hon. Lady complains that I acted on Portugal when we saw the data, yet she complains that I did not act on India before we had the data. She cannot have it both ways. She asked me to follow data not dates, but then asked me to prejudge the data by making a decision about 21 June right now. I am a bit confused about that one, too, because I notice that the Scottish Government have themselves been reopening. That is a perfectly reasonable decision for the Scottish Government, but it is a bit rich then for the SNP spokesman to come to this House and have a go at us for deciding to look at the data over the next week, rather than prejudging that decision. It is quite hard to listen and not respond to explain what is actually going on.

The third point I will make is on international vaccination. Absolutely this country has stepped up to the plate. Of the 2 billion doses delivered around the world, half a billion have been the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, which was developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford, with UK taxpayers’ money. It is, as I put it in my statement, a gift to the world. Of course we do not rule out donating excess doses as and when we have them, but only when we have excess doses, and I am sure the hon. Lady will accept that position is agreed not only by the UK Government, but by the devolved Administrations, because we all want to make sure that the people whom we serve get the chance to be vaccinated as soon as possible. That is our approach.

Finally, when it comes to intellectual property, we support intellectual property rights in this country. We could not get drugs to market in the way we manage to without support for intellectual property, because it is often necessary to put billions of pounds into research in order to get the returns over the medium term. What we did, more than a year ago, was agree with Oxford and AstraZeneca that there would be no charge for the intellectual property rights on this vaccine right around the world, and I am delighted that others are starting to take the same approach. Last month, Pfizer announced that in low and lower middle-income countries, it will not charge intellectual property, but we have been on this for more than a year now, so it is a bit rich to hear a lecture from north of the border.

[Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

May I ask the Secretary of State about his Department’s role in the latest international travel restrictions? First, what happened to the green watch list, giving more time to prepare for a switch to amber? Did he receive scientific advice that Portugal should be moved to amber, and, if so, will he publish that advice? Has the World Health Organisation recognised the Nepal delta mutation as a variant? Can he confirm that there were just 12 cases of this mutant in Portugal and three times as many in the UK? Ultimately, can he give me a milestone for when we can unlock international travel—perhaps the double-jabbing of over-50s and the clinically extremely vulnerable? Without that milestone, it is difficult to see how we can ever give this industry and workforce hope for their future.

[Matt Hancock]

My hon. Friend rightly asks these important questions about the decisions we had to take on Portugal. The truth is that we acted, yes, on the scientific advice: the advice of the joint biosecurity centre, based on the best information we had about this new variant—so-called delta AW, because it is a variant on the delta variant itself. We took that advice.

Restoring international travel in the medium term is an incredibly important goal that we need to work to. It is going to be challenging and hard because of the risk of new variants, and variants popping up in places such as Portugal that otherwise have a relatively low case rate. But the biggest challenge and the reason this is so difficult is that a variant that undermines the vaccine effort would undermine the return to domestic freedom, and that must be protected at all costs.

Thankfully, the delta variant itself, after two doses, gets effectively the same coverage as the old alpha variant or indeed the original variant, so the fact that that is now dominant in the UK does not put our strategy at risk. It makes it more of a challenge of getting from here to there, but that is a challenge for the decision this week and how we handle things in the short term; it does not put the strategy at risk. A variant that undermined the vaccine fundamentally would put us in a much more difficult place as a country, and that is why we are being as cautious as we are.

[Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)]

As the Secretary of State has pointed out himself, data has been key in the pandemic. I agree with him, having previously worked briefly for NHS Digital, that data saves lives. I also agree with him that patient data belongs to the patient, and one of the things I learned during my time working in data is that public trust is key. So why will the Secretary of State not pause this data collection programme, which patients must opt out of by 23 June, to mount a full public information and communication campaign and be explicit about how people’s sensitive data might be used and by whom?

[Matt Hancock]

We are explicit about that. I appreciate what the hon. Lady said about the importance of data and data saving lives, and I agree with her about the importance of trust and bringing people with you. In fact, a large majority of those in the NHS are now actively enthusiastic about using data better. I very much hope we can keep it that way, not least because everybody has now seen the importance of using data to manage a crisis. One of the reasons for the vaccine success—why it has been rolled out so effectively—is that the data architecture that underpins the vaccine roll-out is extremely effective, and I pay tribute to the people who built it.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con) [V]]

In Harrow, because of the delta variant, we have surge testing in our schools: 13,000 young people have been tested at school and 12,000 relatives at home. This weekend, 3,280 vaccinations took place because we had two new pop-up vaccination centres for 18-year-olds and over. Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating the entire team who have made this massive project, so diligently followed, to enable people to be safe in Harrow, but will he also consider having further pop-up clinics for 18-year-olds so that we can get everyone vaccinated as soon as possible?

[Matt Hancock]

I pay tribute to the team at Harrow, and especially for the testing expansion. My hon. Friend said that there were 13,000 pupils and 12,000 of their relatives, and that includes me, because one of my children goes to school in the Harrow area. We got our PCR tests at home, we sat around the kitchen table and we all did them together, and I am glad to say they were all negative. This showed me—I felt like a mystery shopper —how effective this surge testing can be in making sure that we tackle these problems. We have seen that surge testing can work. We saw it in south London, where it worked. We have seen it in Bolton, where the case rate has come down. It has been used in Hounslow. It has been used in other specific areas, and I am glad it is now under way in Harrow to try to keep this under control.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the Secretary of State for his statement, as always. He has been clear in the approach that has been taken to the Indian variant, which is currently posing difficulties. I am anxious to understand the level of co-operation and data-sharing with the devolved Assemblies. In particular, I am aware that we are dealing with possible cases in Kilkeel in County Down in Northern Ireland, where 1,000 homes have been visited and 900 tests carried out by a specialised mobile unit. It is clear that the Indian variant problem must have a UK solution presented.

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. We talk about this when the Northern Ireland Health Minister and the Scottish and Welsh Health Secretaries join me on a weekly call. We are acutely aware of the importance of tackling the delta variant, as it is now called, and it is something we work on very closely together across the UK.

[Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend confirm that what he said on “The Andrew Marr Show” was not a change of policy—a sudden retreat from the road map—and that no final decisions have been taken on what happens on 21 June? Can we still hope, in particular, that events involving big gatherings—weddings and all those kinds of things—can start up again, because they are so important both for our economy and jobs and for our quality of life?

[Matt Hancock]

Absolutely. As I said then, it is too early to make this decision. We have to look at the data and we will announce the decision next week. When answering a logical question of, “Are you open to delay?”, if you have not made a decision on whether to delay or not, by dint of logic, you are open to delay. That is, I think, a perfectly reasonable and logical answer to a question. It is an absolute classic: a politician answers a straight question with a straight answer and it causes all sorts of complications.

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

We have seen in the past year unprecedented restrictions on our freedoms, for reasons that we in this place predominantly entirely understand—the pressure on our national health service and the escalating hospitalisations and death rates. Given the statistics that the Secretary of State has just published and the tremendous success of the vaccination programme in preventing hospitalisations of people doubly vaccinated, what additional freedoms are won for those people, and should we now be considering whether people who have been doubly vaccinated should be able to get additional freedoms as it appears that they will not be the cause of large numbers of hospitalisations in the future?

[Matt Hancock]

The hon. Gentleman is obviously a mentor of his former leader, Tony Blair, who made this case at the weekend. We are looking into this question for certain occasions. It will be necessary for international travel. However, in this country we have moved together—everyone is treated equally—in the same way that the virus treats us equally. I note that Israel, which did bring this proposal in, has now removed it.

[Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)]

The Secretary of State’s announcement that we are opening up appointments for 25-year-olds will be warmly welcomed by many in the NHS in my area, so I thank him for that. On any possible delay to stage 4 of the road map on the 21st of this month, I totally get the logic that he is talking about; he is absolutely right to reserve judgment until one week before, as was always to be the case when the road map was published. However, may I gently press him to tell the House what we would be delaying for? Would it be a world without covid and therefore without any possibility of a variant of concern in the future, which I do not think is his belief? Can he see, though, why, for many, that would be to write covid a blank cheque and just continually delay?

[Matt Hancock]

That is an excellent question astutely put. The purpose of the road map, and the purpose of following the data within the road map and therefore having not-before dates, is that we are in a race between the vaccine programme and the virus, and with the delta variant the virus got extra legs. Our goal, sadly, is not a covid-free world, because that is impossible; the goal is to live with covid much as we live with some other unpleasant diseases, including, of course, flu. That does mean that there will be vaccinations long into the future; it means that, especially in winter, in hospitals for instance, we will have to be very careful to prevent infection from spreading; and it means that we will have to live with this virus and manage our way through it, but with the supreme power of science and the vaccine at our hand. That will be so powerful, and it is already proving, including through the data that I announced to the House just now, to be an incredibly powerful ally in getting us through this. However, at the moment, only 76% of people have had the jab and only 52% of people have had both jabs, and unlike with the previous variant, the second jab appears to be even more important this time around.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green) [V]]

The Government’s former chief scientific adviser and the chair of Independent SAGE, Sir David King, warned today that current covid figures are

“evidence of another wave appearing”,

while the Office for National Statistics estimates a 76% increase in cases in England in the week ending 29 May. Given that the delta variant is more transmissible, has a higher risk of hospitalisation and has more vaccine escape the Kent variant, can the Secretary of State explain why he is not ruling out now any further lifting of restrictions on 21 June, so that we can get more adults double vaccinated first? Given that he acknowledges greater transmissibility among secondary pupils, will he look again at reversing the decision to end mask wearing in classrooms and at funding schools to enable them to increase ventilation? He says that he wants to keep schools open, and so do I, so why not take all the necessary steps to ensure that we can, and follow the advice of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, Indie SAGE and many experts?

[Matt Hancock]

But why? Why on earth would you say, “I’m going to rule out doing something in two weeks’ time,” when we know that the extra data that we will get over the next week will help to make a more refined and more careful decision? I do not understand this argument that has been put by the SNP and the Green party that we should just make a decision now, when we will know more in a week’s time, so that is what we are going to do.

[Lee Anderson (Ashfield) (Con)]

Now then, I see that our NHS has published its very own woke alphabet, which includes terms such as “white fragility” for the letter W. Not only is this a load of nonsense, but it is very divisive. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the vast majority of our brilliant NHS staff are more interested in keeping the nation healthy than in learning the ABC of wokery?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, I agree with my hon. Friend. He puts it well. This so-called glossary appeared on the NHS website. I have raised it with the NHS and it has been taken down.

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

On 15 May last year, the Secretary of State said at a press conference:

“Right from the start we’ve tried to throw a protective ring around our care homes.”

Instead, we have seen over 40,000 families lose elderly and vulnerable loved ones in care. His unwillingness to accept what care workers, doctors and relatives were telling him led to shortages of personal protective equipment and a revolving door from covid wards to care homes. Will he guarantee that care homes will be properly protected in subsequent surges, and will he accept his own failings and apologise to the families who tragically lost loved ones in care?

[Matt Hancock]

I am, of course, part of a family who have also lost a loved one who lived in a care home, so of course I take this very seriously. We followed the clinical advice when the world knew far less about this virus, and it was a challenge. The clinical advice and data since have shown that, in fact, community transmission was the major source of the incursion of the virus into care homes. I am delighted that, through the enormous efforts to increase testing, including the 100,000 testing target, we were then able to introduce the very significant staff testing that we have today, which is the main reason that there has been a fall in the second peak and much lower incidence in care homes. It is vital that we learn the lessons—it is vital that we learn the right lessons—and I am glad to say that, over the summer, we were able to put in stronger protections based on the updated clinical advice.

[Holly Mumby-Croft (Scunthorpe) (Con)]

The case rate in north Lincolnshire is 19 per 100,000 and we have seen incredibly low levels of hospitalisation since the middle of May. That is due, I am sure, to the vaccination effort and all those people who have had their jab. People in Scunthorpe have done everything they have been asked to do, so does my right hon. Friend agree that unless we meet an incredibly high bar of evidence, we will proceed with the opening on 21 June?

--- Later in debate ---

[Matt Hancock]

We will look at that evidence and make that judgment. Of course I want to proceed, but we must proceed safely and not see this go backwards. When the Prime Minister set out the roadmap, he said he wanted it to be “cautious and irreversible.” So far, we have succeeded in making it irreversible, and I hope we can keep it that way.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

This Government are keener to protect borders with regards to immigration than they are regarding public health. The right hon. Gentleman says he is considering the data, but had hotel quarantine been in place for all travellers, we would not have this delta variant spike. Will he reconsider what the Scottish National party is asking for, which is quarantine for all travellers, as well as protection for the travel industry with the right support? That will get the UK economy up and running in a more sustainable manner.

[Matt Hancock]

We have brought in this incredibly strong travel regime, including the need for all travellers to be tested, and calls and home visits to those quarantining at home. That is based on risk, and we have taken the approach of being tough at the borders so as to protect the success of the vaccine roll-out here at home.

[Chris Grayling (Epsom and Ewell) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend should take great credit, as should his team, for the progress of the vaccination programme, and I congratulate him on it. Is it true that the Joint Biosecurity Centre said that Malta could be put on the green list?

[Matt Hancock]

It is true that a number of balanced cases are put before Ministers, and we always look at the pros and cons of each one. Ultimately, those decisions are for Ministers.

[Mr Speaker]

Welcome back Andrew Gwynne.

[Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. In his statement, the Secretary of State mentioned the rising cases of the delta variant across north-west England, and the impact of the vaccination programme on reducing hospitalisations. That is positive news, but the consequence of increasing covid rates, even without hospitalisations, is not totally positive. May I ask him about long covid—something that is close to my heart, having had it for 12 months? Beyond the actions he has already taken, what more will he do to help those who, inevitably, will develop long-term consequences and symptoms of covid from the latest wave of the delta variant?

[Matt Hancock]

This incredibly important subject is close to my heart too, and perhaps we can work with the hon. Gentleman, with his personal experience of long covid over such a period, to ensure that we drive that agenda as hard as possible. The NHS has stepped forward and we have put more money into research, but this is an unknown condition as a result of a novel virus. It is a complicated condition and there are many different types of long covid. I would be keen to ensure that the hon. Gentleman engages with the NHS work on this.

[Felicity Buchan (Kensington) (Con)]

I represent a very international constituency where people travel for business, family and personal reasons, and not just for two weeks in summer in the sun. I am concerned that the cost of PCR tests is prohibitive, and the lack of certainty beyond three weeks under the traffic light system has a material effect on business and wellbeing. Will my right hon. Friend’s Department consider further whether lateral flow tests can be substituted for PCR tests to at least alleviate that concern and cost?

[Matt Hancock]

Part of the purpose of the international testing regime is to get genetic sequences to spot variants, which we cannot do from a lateral flow test. That is the literal answer to my hon. Friend’s question. More broadly, the approach we are taking instead is to try to drive down the costs of PCR tests. Bringing a private market for PCR tests for travel has led to a significant reduction in cost, and that is another good example of harnessing private markets to improve people’s lives. The companies involved are strongly incentivised to deliver tests for a lower price. That is the approach we have taken for the reason I set out, and that is the decision we have made.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

The Royal College of General Practitioners, the Doctors’ Association UK and the British Medical Association have all expressed concern about the adequacy of communication with patients about the proposals for data sharing. From the answer that the Secretary of State gave to the Opposition Front Bencher—the right hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth)—and to my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson), he obviously disagrees with that, but in the interests of making data-based decisions, can he tell the House what his Department is doing to assess the level of patient awareness about what will happen if they do not opt out by 23 June?

[Matt Hancock]

We are doing work in this area and talking to all the relevant bodies. Aside from some who have not yet understood the full importance of high-quality usage of data in the health system, actually, the vast majority of people, including the BMA, the Royal College of GPs and others, can see the benefit of getting this right. So we are working with them. The goal, though, is really clear—to use data better in the NHS because data saves lives.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

The Secretary of State laid out a number of decisions that will be announced next Monday, and the most significant of those will be on social distancing. If that remains, whatever else changes, we will not have gone anywhere close to back to normal. However, can I press him a bit on vaccine efficacy? The SNP spokesman, the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford), said that the first dose was only 30% effective. I believe that that is correct for transmission, but as for what is actually important, which is reducing serious disease and hospitalisation, the first dose is significantly more effective than that. Will the Secretary of State set out to the House his and the Department’s current understanding about the efficacy of the vaccine on the first dose and the second dose against serious disease and hospitalisation?

[Matt Hancock]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right about the figure for transmissibility reduction from the first dose. The figures for the reduction in serious disease and death are, as he says, higher than that, but since I do not have the precise figures in my head, what I propose to do is set them out tomorrow at the Dispatch Box at Health questions.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP) [V]]

The Secretary of State seems to be the master of mixed messages. Today, he tells us that the vaccination programme is going well, cases are down and hospital admissions have fallen, yet at the weekend, he was telling us that he is still open to removing the date for freedom day—21 June—and keeping restrictions in place. A few weeks ago, he was telling people that they could go to Portugal, yet, despite Portugal having lower infection rates than we do and only 1.5% of people being tested positive on return from Portugal, he has now put it on the amber list, costing the airline industry millions of pounds and putting holidaymakers to great expense. Does he understand the frustration that businesses and individuals have at the way in which, acting on his advice, they take precautions, spend money and take actions that they think are right, yet find that, when he changes his message, they are placed at a disadvantage?

[Matt Hancock]

Of course I understand those frustrations—of course I do—and that is why we would all like to be out of this pandemic, but John Maynard Keynes’ famous dictum comes to mind, which is: “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?” A pandemic is a hard thing to manage and communicating uncertainty in the public sphere is difficult. When answering questions about uncertainty, I think the fairest thing that any of us at the Government Dispatch Box can do is answer fully and frankly to the best of our knowledge and understanding, and that does include things where there is evidence on one side and evidence on the other. We had a question from the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) that described only the negative side of what we are seeing in the data, but on the positive side we are seeing the impact of vaccinations that the right hon. Gentleman just mentioned. There are two sides to the story, and that is why some of the judgments are difficult. That is why we will wait until we have the most data possible, with a week to spare, so that people can implement the decisions we make regarding 21 June.

[Mr William Wragg (Hazel Grove) (Con)]

I reassure my right hon. Friend that, since last we spoke in this Chamber, I have received my first jab. As the age limit lowers, the more youthful of us in this House benefit—although the years have not been kind. His announcement that the limit is to go down still further, to 25, is excellent news. I thank everyone in the vaccination centres in Hazel Grove, Woodley and Offerton and other places in my constituency for their tremendous work. Will my right hon. Friend go further with his surge of vaccinations? That is how we will end this pandemic. Will he commit to reducing the time between first and second jabs and do all he can to secure greater supply? Give us the jabs and we will finish the job.

[Matt Hancock]

A propos my previous answer, there is again a balance here. Obviously, we want to go as fast as possible, but, on the other hand, the strength of overall protection people get grows, on the latest clinical advice, up to an eight-week gap. So a longer gap gives them better overall long-term protection. That is why we have reduced the gap from the 12 weeks we had at the start, because we wanted to get as many first jabs done with the early doses we had, to eight weeks; but the clinical recommendation is not to go below eight weeks, because people would end up with weaker overall protection from both jabs. That is the reason for our approach, but ultimately we want to go as fast as we clinically safely can with the programme. For that, we need all the good folk of Hazel Grove who are doing so much to make this happen and to deliver jabs in arms, and I thank them all.

[Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab) [V]]

A number of my constituents were out in Portugal and were taken completely by surprise by the Government’s about-turn on their advice and rules on travel to Portugal. It has cost some of them many hundreds of pounds. It is important that we remember that hundreds of thousands of jobs depend on the travel industry, and many people in my constituency work in that industry or rely on it. The Government must start to be clear about what they are going to do about travel overseas. Given the high number of people in this country who have been vaccinated, subject to the countries they are going to having high rates of vaccination and low rates of covid, there is no reason why they should not be able to travel.

[Matt Hancock]

I cannot say any more than I have already said. We take a cautious approach to travel because of the risk of new variants, which could undermine the whole thing. We have a traffic-light system because some countries are safer to travel to than others.

[Sir Graham Brady (Altrincham and Sale West) (Con)]

Children and young people have missed out on so much over the past 15 months or so—both educational opportunities and opportunities for important social development. Today, my right hon. Friend received a letter from a number of Jewish youth groups that run residential summer camps. They are desperately worried that, if the rule of 30 remains after 21 June, what they do simply will not be viable. I am sure that the same is true of many other youth groups. Can he give some reassurance that those safe, regulated, largely outdoor activities will be able to go ahead for groups of much more than 30?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, of course, as part of step 3, those activities were reopened for school-based groups. I absolutely take the point that my hon. Friend is making. That is of course part of step 4. He has made his point clearly.

[Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)]

In April last year, Government guidance in relation to hospital discharges clearly stated:

“Negative tests are not required prior to transfers/admissions into the care home.”

One month and many deaths later, the Secretary of State very clearly said on national television that

“right from the start we have tried to throw a protective ring around our care homes.”

Since then, the guidance seems to have disappeared from Government websites, and this weekend he has denied making those claims, yet again today he expects us to trust this Government’s judgment in deciding how we should continue to live our lives. Why on earth should we?

[Matt Hancock]

I am terribly sorry: all the policy and all the guidance was, of course, set out in public around care homes. It was a very challenging policy, not least because—as the hon. Lady implied in what she quoted—the tests were not available to be able to do this, and the clinical advice was that asymptomatic transmission was highly unlikely. That was the basis on which these decisions were taken. The challenge in care homes was equally a challenge in Scotland and a challenge in Wales— a challenge all over Europe, in fact. The decision making in this area is a matter of record. A huge number of people were trying their very best to solve the problem as best they possibly could, based on the very best science and clinical advice.

[Esther McVey (Tatton) (Con)]

The Secretary of State will recall telling us that the first lockdown was needed to give time to build capacity in the NHS. Can he therefore tell us how many more hospital beds are available in the NHS now than in March last year?

[Matt Hancock]

That is a good question, but the main capacity that we built was the Nightingales, a very successful project. The Nightingale project was one of the finest examples of rapid action in the NHS that has been seen. Thank goodness we had the Nightingale hospitals, because the people treated in them got treatment that was otherwise likely not to have been available. It meant that we could keep that promise all the way through—that nobody was denied treatment for covid. People got the treatment they needed because we managed to build that capacity so quickly.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I hope that the Health Secretary will understand the frustration that there will be right across the country if the 21 June date ends up being delayed by the Government because their own border policies failed to prevent the Delta variant from spreading, because they were too slow in putting India on the red list and because of gaps in the amber list policies. Given the confusion that there still is about the way in which the Government are taking decisions on individual countries on the border, is it not time that he accepted the recommendation that the Select Committee on Home Affairs made last August that he publish not just the data, but the analysis and advice from the Joint Biosecurity Centre? The analysis and advice from SAGE is published, so why is the Joint Biosecurity Centre’s advice being kept secret?

[Matt Hancock]

The right hon. Lady and I have had this exchange before. I respect her enormously, but she continues to imply that we should have taken decisions based on data that we did not yet have. That is simply not a reasonable position for the Chair of any Select Committee to take.

[Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

The statistical snapshot that my right hon. Friend gave in his statement showed that just over 2% of people hospitalised with the Indian variant had had both jabs. In order to encourage everyone to get vaccinated, will he in future publish on a daily basis how many patients in hospital with covid have previously had one jab, two jabs or no jabs at all? If that information is not held centrally, should it not be?

[Matt Hancock]

I am delighted by that question, because the data that I put in my statement was right off the press—it is new data. I am absolutely happy to look at how it is published and on what basis. I hear my right hon. Friend’s call for it to be published daily; we do update most of this data daily on the website. We have not got to that point yet—we have done a first cut of the data up to 3 June, as I read out—but the critical question is how many cases are translating into hospitalisations and then into deaths. I am very glad that we were able to do the first cut today, and I will see what I can do on publication.

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) [V]]

The Government are pushing through a data grab that will see GP patient records held on a central database, which will, in turn, be available to private companies. Anyone getting the covid-19 vaccine from 1 July will have their GP record updated and so uploaded to that database on that day, often without their knowledge. There are enough fears adding to vaccine hesitancy and the Government are now adding concerns about data privacy to that, so will the Secretary of State agree to stop this data grab, undertake a full consultation with patients about sharing their personal data and publicise just how they can opt out?

[Matt Hancock]

The way the hon. Lady characterises this policy proposal is not accurate. People listening to this debate should be reassured that the privacy and security of their data are absolutely paramount. I look forward to her working with the NHS and with government to reassure people about the use of their data, because, ultimately, by making sure that we can understand what is happening, we can find better treatments, improve individuals’ treatment and save lives. This is all about making sure we use the best of modern technology to save lives and, in the process, improve the privacy and security of data. I hope she will take that message and reassurance and pass it on to her constituents and others with whom she is working, because, ultimately, improving and saving lives is the NHS’s historic mission and this policy proposal is just another small step in that.

[Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con) [V]]

I welcome the Secretary of State’s confirmation that we will hit the end of July target of vaccinating all adults in England. Will he give us a bit of a forward look to what he is planning for the autumn in terms of the flu season and any covid booster jabs? Is he expecting all adults over 50 to have a third jab? Does he think that that will be at the same time as a flu jab? Will it be combined? Or will we have to have two separate healthcare visits?

[Matt Hancock]

We are working on exactly that question. Of course, there is the question in advance of that of the vaccination of 12 to 18-year-olds, on which we are taking advice from the JCVI. We are conducting trials as to what are the best jabs to give, given which two previous jabs people have had, to give them the strongest protection. The third thing we are doing is working with AstraZeneca to develop a vaccine specifically targeted at the variants—that was part of the G7 work and announcements last week. If we can give a flu jab and a covid booster jab at the same time, that would be great. That is also under clinical evaluation, because, obviously, it would make the logistics so much easier over the autumn. Likewise, I am taking advice on which age groups and which groups it should be for: whether it should just be for the over-50s or for everybody; how to vaccinate; what group to put health and social care workers in; and whether there is a special regime for those who live in care homes, as there was in the first round of vaccination, where care home residents and staff came first. All of those are live questions on which we do not yet have answers, but that is the scope of the decisions we need to make ahead of the autumn for the autumn vaccination programme.

[Neale Hanvey (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (Alba)]

The progress with the vaccination roll-out is really to be welcomed and I give my thanks to all the staff, vaccinators and others who have been responsible for that progress. There are understandable concerns about how we manage and deal with variants, and my questions are centred on that today. What surveillance is taking place on the following measures or what is proposed? These are really important issues: the longevity of immunogenesis and how that is going to be captured; the adaptability of the virus and how that is going to be countered; and the need to modify or develop new vaccines as we progress into a position where the majority of the population are vaccinated.

[Matt Hancock]

I join the hon. Gentleman in congratulating all those involved in the vaccine roll-out, everywhere in the UK. In Scotland, it has been a remarkable effort, with the UK Government working with the Scottish Administration, the NHS across the country, local councils and the armed services—it has been a big team effort, and that has been part of the success of the vaccine roll-out.

The hon. Gentleman asked about three critical areas of the science. Reviews of all three areas are ongoing. They are led by Professor Jonathan Van-Tam, the deputy chief medical officer, whom the hon. Gentleman may have heard of, who is an absolutely brilliant clinician in this space—there are a lot more people involved who are doing excellent scientific work on these questions. That surveillance on immunogenicity, the work on the next-generation variant vaccine and the work on understanding the variants as we spot them is all going on. Public Health England has done a huge amount of work, working with public health colleagues right across the country, and I am grateful to them all.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I thank the Secretary of State for his statement today and for responding to 31 questions in just over one hour.

Before we move on to the next statement, we will suspend for three minutes.

Health and Social Care

Matt Hancock Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2021 Ministerial Corrections

The following is an extract from the urgent question on 27 May 2021.

[Matt Hancock]

What I would say to the people of Bolton is that they have again risen to this challenge. The number of vaccinations happening in Bolton right now is phenomenal—tens of thousands every single day.

[Official Report, 27 May 2021, Vol. 696, c. 538.]

Letter of correction from the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, the right hon. Member for West Suffolk (Matt Hancock).

An error has been identified in my response to the hon. Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi).

The correct response should have been:

[Matt Hancock]

What I would say to the people of Bolton is that they have again risen to this challenge. The number of vaccinations happening in Bolton right now is phenomenal—tens of thousands every single week.