Covid-19: Response

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Monday 27th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, I gave the Minister notice on Friday that, because we had not taken a Statement about Covid for three weeks, I will need to address the three Statements that are outstanding.

Parliament entrusted this Government with huge powers to deal with Covid-19 when we put the emergency powers on the statute book in March. Certainly, in this House, at the time of the passage of the emergency legislation we sought and received undertakings from the Minister and the Government about the need for effective scrutiny, timely debate, consultation and trust. So how will accountability be achieved during the Recess and the autumn in this fast-moving world? All three Statements raised vital issues that deserve more time and scrutiny than we were able to give them, and I am grateful for the extra time that the usual channels have found for Back-Bench colleagues.

Before I address these Statements, I want to ask Minister about the sudden announcement this weekend of quarantine measures for those returning from Spain. These Benches have made it clear that we support evidence-based protective measures at the border. We have long called for the scientific evidence to be made public and for track, trace and isolate systems to be in place, to avoid the need for the blunt tool of 14-day quarantine. Does the Minister agree that the latest decision-making process regarding Spain and the short notice for travellers have created a sense of panic and suggest a loss of control? Will he agree that proper contingency plans should be in place to support people coming home where there is no guarantee that their employers will allow them 14 days of work flexibility? Why do the measures apply to the whole of Spain? As my honourable friend Jon Ashworth MP said yesterday, “We’ve got an outbreak here in Leicester, but the whole of Leicestershire is not locked down and the whole of the East Midlands is not locked down, so why are the Balearics and the Canaries included when their infection rate is so low?”

On the announcement on 14 July about face masks and shopping—a month after it became mandatory to wear masks on public transport—why did it take so long and why was the messaging so confusing? We have long known about airborne transmission. The Secretary of State warned long ago about asymptomatic transmission. The Secretary of State’s own advice published on 11 May advised in favour of wearing face masks, so it is a shame that it took two months to make that advice mandatory; it came into force last Friday. How will it be enforced? As a former member of USDAW, I am very concerned for shop workers. USDAW says:

“We are also deeply concerned that enforcing the wearing of face coverings could present a further flashpoint for abuse against our retail members.”


It makes the point that full government guidance was released only hours before the changes came into effect, so how were employers to have adequate time to put the policy in place to support their staff during these changes?

On the Leicester lockdown announced on 16 July, the people of Leicester are now in the 17th week of lockdown. We will discuss that issue on Wednesday, but will the Minister confirm what lessons the Government have learned from what they did and did not do in Leicester, for when they face other local flare-ups? Will the Minister guarantee—I would like a yes or no answer—that local authorities will now get the specific data that can facilitate action, that it will be timely and in the form of person-identifiable data, not just postcodes, and that it will include not just positive but negative results so that they can understand the overall infection prevalence? Will they receive the contact tracing data so that they will know who has been asked to isolate by test and trace and can follow them up? Will they receive the data on a daily basis? Once a week is not good enough. The virus does not wait a week, so why should local directors of public health have to wait a week?

Moving on, the financial Statement said that £10 billion had been allocated to test and trace. It would be helpful if the Minister could itemise what that £10 billion has been spent on and with whom. A letter to me lodged in the Library would probably suffice for that question. On 20 July last week, the Secretary of State made a comprehensive Statement—a sort of end-of-term report; I can pick out only one or two important matters and hope that other noble Lords will cover the rest. The news about vaccine progress was very welcome and exciting, but will the Government ensure that there is equitable access to a vaccine when it is developed? The Minister knows that we stand shoulder to shoulder with the Government in taking on poisonous anti-vax propaganda. However, if a vaccine does not become available, what scenario planning is taking place right now, should we be confronted with that awful prospect? Will the Minister take this opportunity to update the House on R? Are we still below 1? Which parts of the country are not?

On social care, we welcome the fact that families are now able to visit their loved ones in care homes and we also welcome the extra funding for the NHS announced by the Prime Minister. But there was no extra funding for social care. Will social care get any more resources this winter? This is underlined by the Government’s failure to reimburse care homes properly for PPE and testing costs during the pandemic. They will actively have to meet the additional costs of ensuring that care homes stay safe for residents, staff and visitors. It must be cost-effective that they do so. The Local Government Association has today called for a social care reset after reflection on the Prime Minister’s pledge to fix social care a year ago. That representative body has urged the Government to publish their timetable for social care reform prior to Parliament’s return from the Summer Recess in September. Will the Minister tell the House whether that is possible?

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, from these Liberal Democrat Benches, I thank and congratulate all the millions of people, whether paid staff or volunteers, who have worked tirelessly over the last five months to combat this pandemic, serving people and providing support during what is the most extraordinary health crisis in 100 years. As the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, outlined, it is very disappointing that the Government Whips’ Office has resisted giving your Lordships’ House the opportunity to have a timely discussion on each of the three Covid Statements, on 14, 16 and 20 July. Each covered different, urgent and serious matters for our country that should be scrutinised by your Lordships’ House, so I too will use all three Statements as the basis for my questions to the Minister today.

First, given that the report of 20 July has a strategic and end-of-term report feel, we have an overarching concern about the Government’s repeated mantra in Statements about protecting the NHS at all costs, including the preparations for a second wave. Unfortunately, it appears that lessons have not been learned from the consequences of that single priority, not least those from throwing our care sector to the wolves without adequate testing, PPE or financial support for its massively increased costs. So I ask the Minister again: do all parts of the care sector now have repeat and regular testing, the PPE they need to practise new standards of infection control and continuing financial support for the consequences of both?

As I mentioned on Friday in the debate on the coronavirus regulations, a further group feel they have been left high and dry: people who shield, whether they are disabled, elderly or have serious underlying conditions. So I again ask: will the Minister explain why the letter to shielders dated 22 June insists that shielders lose all the support for shielding from 1 August? The letter instructs recipients to follow strict social distancing at all times and to stay at home where possible but, in complete contradiction to that, also instructs people to return to work if it is Covid-safe and removes access to furlough pay and sick pay, so if it is not safe to return to work and shielders cannot work from home, they are now at high risk of losing their jobs. Blood Cancer UK is extremely concerned about this risk for people who have been shielding as from August they will face an impossible choice between returning to work and risking their health or staying at home and risking unemployment. It asked the Government to extend the furlough scheme for the small number of people involved for up to three months or to provide alternative financial support to protect them from life-threatening ill health, and we agree. Will the Minister undertake to raise this with the Chancellor of the Exchequer as a matter of urgency and write to me?

Lifting the lockdown also brings into sharp relief how much real progress has been made by the Government on testing, tracing and isolating as a key tool to manage outbreaks. To that we must again add quarantine arrangements. On the news today, following the Spain quarantine regulations, we heard the Government say that they will not be monitoring any quarantine arrangements. They are still experimenting with temperature screening at airports and are not routinely testing people as they arrive in the country. If we are serious about having a proper system for people arriving in this country and quarantining safely, when will that be put in place?

We also hear that testing capacity will shortly reach 500,000 a day, which is welcome, but there seems to be no routine to test that capacity to the full. It is still not universal, despite repeated requests, regularly to test NHS and care staff to keep them safe. We hear that many local testing centres are closing down and that the test at home system is to stop. Can the Minister reassure your Lordships’ House that a full test, trace, isolate and quarantine policy is in operation, not least to test the larger-scale, effective system that we will need in the event of a second wave? How many people were tested on Friday?

Finally—the Minister can probably recite my next question as I have asked it so often, but I will be grateful if he could answer my actual question, not repeat the usual mantra because just saying that local authorities are being given more data at postcode level is not enough—when will all local authorities and directors of public health get the full data that they have requested and signed data protection releases for on a daily basis and at a more granular level than postcode, without which they cannot effectively tackle spikes in cases swiftly? The Minister saying that he is giving them more data is not enough. It must be the data that they need and for which they have already signed data protection releases.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Lord Bethell) (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Thornton and Lady Brinton, for their detailed questions, which I will go through as speedily and thoroughly as I can.

On accountability during the Recess, there are long-standing precedents on this and we will obey them, as is normal.

On the arrangements for Spain, I reassure the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, that there is a very thorough system of regular meetings to assess the exemptions on travel. This is done at several levels of government and detailed intelligence from the front line is provided to those meetings. However, the situation in many countries is fast changing, and the Spanish situation is a good example. The information we had at the beginning of last week was quite different from the information we had by the end of the week. Fast turnaround decisions are not a sign of panic or weakness; they are a sign that the system works and is working well. We are trying to be as flexible as we can and we respect the country’s desire to travel, but when the infection rate in overseas countries moves, we have to move quickly as well. Within individual countries, there is no way for us to control intra-country transport. It is therefore very difficult and challenging to have a regional exemption list. That is why we have not been able to give exemptions to the Balearics, and I say that with a personal interest in the matter.

Our guidance on face masks is based on trust. There is no compulsion and they are not mandatory. In some countries they are mandatory, but not in this country. That is why the science is so important to us, and it is one reasons that we may have moved behind some other countries. The guidance we now have on face masks is extremely clear. I pay tribute to the large and growing number of people wearing them. I believe this country is moving in the right direction.

We are concerned about shopworkers. USDAW makes a good case for the need to protect shopworkers who may be put in an awkward situation. That is why we work closely with the police to ensure that the right protections are in place.

I say a profound thank you to the people of Leicester, who have done an incredible amount in a difficult situation. The signs are that the prevalence of the disease has come down a long way in Leicester thanks to their commitment. The lessons we have learned include some of the most obvious lessons you could learn, but there is no replacement for local contacts and the involvement of local communities. However, there are hard-to-reach communities where our message has not got through and we need to do more to reach them. In particular, I am grateful to faith leaders in Leicester who are working with us on preparing for Eid and ensuring that the message on social distancing gets through in time for that important celebration.

Full details of the budget for NHS Test and Trace will be published when the time is right, and when that time arrives I will be glad to place a copy in the Library as requested.

I completely agree with the noble Baroness. Having an equitable distribution of the vaccine in this country and overseas is key to the Government’s policy. That is why we are working hard with the World Health Organization, GAVI and others to ensure that vaccines are shared as a global resource. We hope that a vaccine can be found, and the indications from Oxford are encouraging, but we recognise that vaccines for coronaviruses, particularly those affecting the respiratory system, are difficult. That is why we are making a massive investment in the test-and-trace programme and in therapeutics and why we remain vigilant over local lockdowns—to rid this country of this horrible disease.

Both noble Baronesses spoke about social care. I do not recognise the phrase used by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, that the care sector has been “thrown to the wolves”. I find that an unhelpful characterisation. I say yes to regular testing, yes to PPE and yes to financial support—we have given £3.7 billion to local authorities to help them pay for the cost of Covid-19, and on 2 July we gave a further £500 million to the social care sector. We remain vigilant with regard to the financial resilience of the social care system and we are working very closely with social care providers on the ongoing costs of both testing and PPE, as well as the financial resilience of the entire sector.

On shielders, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, makes a very good case. The handling of those who need shielding is one of the most delicate challenges that we face. Those who through no fault of their own are particularly vulnerable to the effects of the disease are put in an invidious situation, and we are extremely grateful to all those who have gone through the hardship of extreme shielding during this long and difficult time. I take on board all her comments and extend my profound thanks to all those concerned. I will look into the question of the parcels that she raised in the debate last week. My inquiries are ongoing on that, and I will respond to her, as I promised to last week.

On the arrangements for travel, it is true that the current medical advice is that we are currently sceptical whether temperature testing is effective and therefore we have not imposed it.

On testing, it is a frustrating but unavoidable truth that a test today does not necessarily mean that you do not have Covid and that you may not display both the symptoms and contagiousness of Covid in the days ahead. That is why snap testing at airports cannot be a sure-fire and safe route for protecting the country, which is why we have to look at isolation as a way of protecting the country.

On the mandation of isolation, as in other matters to do with Covid, we apply a voluntary principle because we believe that trust is the best way to keep the public on side, and we have neither the legal nor the other resources necessary to impose mandation.

On the questions from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, about the state of the testing programme, I reassure her that testing at home is not stopping and that NHS staff are regularly tested. There is a very clear plan, that plan is heavily resourced and we are continuing to invest in it with innovation, manpower and legal support where necessary.