Coronavirus Act 2020 (Review of Temporary Provisions)

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Wednesday 30th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. We have been working together to try to find a way through this that works both for the House and for the circumstances. There has been a change in the way that schedule 21 is used, and I believe that has reduced some of the concerns in this area, but we will continue to keep it under review.

I will say something about mental health later in my speech. There are measures on mental health in the Act that have not been used and that we are not seeking to renew. I hope that reassures colleagues that we take a proportionate approach to these measures and that although we want to make sure we have the measures we need, when we do not need them we will set them aside.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the Secretary of State for all he has done. I have spoken to him many times about these issues. I am sure that he, like me, has received lots of emails outlining concerns about the stripping back of health and social care. The Government must ensure that such powers can be used only when absolutely necessary and not to save funding while leaving people without appropriate care. Will the Secretary of State please reassure the House as to how the power will be regulated and reassure us that people’s health and social care rights will be protected?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes. The powers in the Act have allowed us not only to ensure that people get the care that they need and that that care is targeted where necessary, but to allow people to get better and faster access to care when they are in hospital and have to leave, by ensuring that a care package is there. In their totality, the measures on care in the Act have without doubt helped us both to protect the NHS and to support social care, and crucially to support the patients who need that care. We will therefore of course take them forward, because of that positive overall effect.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

In the face of pictures from hospitals in Italy and reports from China of the number of people who were dying from this disease, this House gave the Government untrammelled power in this Act to take action to protect the public; but I have to say, Minister, that that power has been used in a way that has frustrated many people across the country. Their ability to work, to socialise, to go to school and to travel has been affected. Often the measures taken have been seen as illogical, inconsistent, contradictory and unnecessarily damaging.

[Jim Shannon]

Very quickly, one of the issues that has come to my attention—the number of emails has been enormous—is to do with the enforcement of vaccines on those people who do not wish to have them. I personally would take such a vaccine, but others will not. Does my hon. Friend agree that when it comes to vaccines, it should be by choice only?

[Sammy Wilson]

Well, of course, that is an issue that the Government will have to address in the future, if ever a vaccine is found.

The important thing is the frustration that many in the public are experiencing at present. It might not have been totally wiped out, but I believe there certainly would have been far more scrutiny if this House had not just had the ability to listen to statements or ask questions, but had actually had the real sanction that if the Minister did not make a consistent and competent case for the measures that he was introducing, they could be voted down. That is why the demand that there be effective scrutiny by this House is important.

We have listened to what the Minister has said, but I am not convinced that we will see that effective scrutiny; because if I heard him right, first, it would only be for matters that are significant. Now, who will make the judgment on whether the issue is significant? I can tell the Minister that, if I own a business and it is decided that it could be closed down, that is significant; yet we do not know who will make that final decision.

The scrutiny will only be for issues that are national. Sixteen million people are currently affected by a range of local decisions and local restrictions. That, to me, is as bad—half the nation, half the country, is affected—yet according to the Minister’s definition today that would not be covered because it would not be a national decision. And, of course, scrutiny will happen where possible. I suppose if the Government wished to escape scrutiny they could always say, “But this has suddenly emerged,” even though the data could have been collected days and days before. So who will decide whether it is possible to have the time to do this?