Greg Smith
Main Page: Greg Smith (Conservative - Buckingham)Department Debates - View all Greg Smith's debates with the Cabinet Office
(3 years, 5 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
As I have said several times today, Scotland has, at the moment, a slightly different approach. It retains a tiered approach, but furlough remains a UK scheme and available across the whole country.
Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)
Professor Karol Sikora of the University of Buckingham Medical School concluded about the first lockdown:
“Many seriously ill people stayed at home, they protected the NHS, but it didn’t save their lives.”
This week, with Macmillan reporting up to 50,000 people with undiagnosed cancer due to covid restrictions, what reassurances can my right hon. Friend give me that, if this House does vote for a second lockdown on Wednesday, the Government will do absolutely everything necessary to avoid a repeat of Professor Sikora’s devastating conclusion from the first lockdown?
The Prime Minister
I understand the point that Professor Sikora makes, and I also understand the concerns of everybody who has cancer or who has a family member who suffers from cancer or any other life-threatening disease. It is precisely to protect those non-covid patients and to give them access to the NHS that we cannot allow our health service to be overwhelmed, as it would be on the current projections. That is why we must take the action that we are taking now. I hope that he sees the point and why it is precisely because we want to help cancer patients that we need to take this action now.