Covid-19 Update

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Programme motion
Monday 19th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

Yes. My hon. Friend has spoken for Burnley with such passion throughout this crisis. It has been very difficult for Burnley, which has now seen the highest case rate among the over-60s in the whole country. It is so important, to protect people in Burnley, that everybody follows the rules there. First, we have to get the case rate and the cases among the over-60s falling. Once that starts to happen we can talk about when we can start to relax the restrictions—I do not want to have them in place for a moment longer than is necessary. With the expansion of testing that we are seeing, I hope we will be able to have more tools at our disposal to hold the virus down once we have got it down again.

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

Rebuilding confidence in Test and Trace is critical, yet the Secretary of State has taken the potentially counterproductive step of arranging for data to be shared with the police for enforcement. That could deter people from getting a test in the first place, as the chief medical officer has reportedly indicated. So will the Secretary of State acknowledge that a more effective strategy would be to ensure that people have the financial security they need in order to be able to follow the rules in the first place? Following on from the question from the hon. Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson), will he answer on whether this memorandum of understanding exists? If it does, will he publish it? If he will not do so, will he explain what he is hiding?

[Matt Hancock]

There is no health data that is transferred, but of course once this House has voted for an enforceable rule, it is important for all of our constituents and communities that we enforce it. So that is a necessary consequence of the House having voted for the self-isolation rules to be made mandatory, which I think was the right decision. On the financial support that the hon. Lady asks for, we have put in place £500 per self-isolation to support people on low incomes to make sure that they are able to do the right thing.