Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (No. 2) (England) (Amendment) (No. 4) Regulations 2020

Baroness Mallalieu Excerpts

Tuesday 6th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Mallalieu (Lab) [V]]

I, too, am sorry for the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, but the fact is that the Government are making a mess of handling this health crisis. As the mayor of Manchester has said, the public have had just about enough of it. Parliamentary democracy has been sidelined, and basic civil liberties have been cancelled. In their place we have been given ever-changing draconian regulations, often incomprehensible, unenforceable and apparently based on speculation, someone’s pet theory or pure guesswork, and all done without any prior debate. This regulation is a good example.

Back in March, we gave the Government almost carte blanche; we wanted them to succeed and we still do. Now, we know a great deal more about Covid and its potential death rate. More people have died of flu and pneumonia over the same period, and many more are likely to die from conditions that have been untreated as a result of this epidemic. We also know that current repressive policies are destroying our industries, our culture, our sport and indeed our way of life.

Randolph Churchill said, “Trust the people”. The Government have not done that, but if they do not do it then people will stop trusting the Government, and that is what is happening. Of course we need rules, but we need sensible ones which everyone can see are sense and which are enforceable. Some people are foolish and irresponsible, and they are now, but no one wants to get Covid and most people will co-operate with things they think are worth doing. If you order people to obey laws which they can see make little sense and which are almost wholly unenforceable, and if you try in this particular regulation to ban things such as “mingling”—whatever that is—you undermine respect for the whole rule of law and you will come to a tipping point in compliance, even with the most law abiding among us. We are reaching it now, and I support the noble Lord, Lord Lamont.