Economic Outlook and Furlough Scheme Changes

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Thursday 18th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn]

My Lords, the Government are providing more support to businesses to reopen safely. A specific fund is available for getting high streets open safely. We are also putting additional funding into the Health and Safety Executive to ensure that any enforcement action necessary can be taken.

[Lord Dobbs (Con) [V]]

The furlough system is delaying rather than solving the epidemic of unemployment about to hit us, particularly among our young. A prime cause of this disastrous loss of jobs is the two-metre rule, which is increasingly ignored by many and in any event is based on science that is widely questioned. May I beg the Government to take their courage in their hands, balance one risk against another, scrap the two-metre rule and in its place issue guidelines that rely primarily on the great common sense that the vast majority of people always show?

[Baroness Penn]

My noble friend will be aware that the PM has commissioned a comprehensive review of the two-metre guidance. It will take advice from a range of experts, including the CMO, the CSA, behavioural scientists and economists. That work will be completed in the coming weeks.