Ben Everitt
Main Page: Ben Everitt (Conservative - Milton Keynes North)Department Debates - View all Ben Everitt's debates with the Cabinet Office
(3 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberThe hon. Lady asks for a timetable, as indeed have many colleagues on both sides of the House. Business rightly wants as much certainty as possible. What we have now, for the first time since this pandemic began, is clear sight of the end and the way to the end. We have set a deadline, as she knows, of the middle of February—15 February—to vaccinate the first four cohorts. I am sure she will appreciate that those groups comprise the overwhelming majority of those who have already, alas, died from covid. She will readily appreciate the implications of that for our ability to reopen our economy, and she will also understand, I hope, the implications that that could have, if all the conditions that I have already described are satisfied, for businesses across the country. I do believe that there are real grounds now for them to be very hopeful and very confident about the months ahead.
We have all seen the data, and people—normal people—do understand the need for this lockdown, but like so many Members on both sides of the House, I worry about our economy, jobs, businesses, mental health and children’s educational attainment. Perhaps the Prime Minister could tell us how normal people—people in Milton Keynes and beyond—will know that things are getting better.
I thank my hon. Friend; he is absolutely right about people’s feelings across the whole country. They want a sense of when things are going to get better, and I have tried to give that today. I really think that with the pace of the vaccine roll-out, if it can accelerate in the way that I think everybody would want, we will reach an important moment on 15 February. As I have said many times in this House, I do believe things will be much better by the spring.