Covid-19

Lord Faulkner of Worcester Excerpts

Wednesday 15th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I absolutely reassure the noble Baroness that teachers will not be involved in the vaccination programme. I pay tribute to the work that teachers have done in organising pupils and, on occasion, administering the swabs themselves. It has been an impactful programme and we are enormously grateful. There is an established vaccination programme that, as I mentioned, makes use of professional nurses. That is the route we will take in this instance.

When it comes to the MQS programme, the bottom line is that hotel quarantine is extremely effective. It really does stop the spread of the disease as it comes into the country. That is absolutely relevant when we have the threat of variants of concern. We keep the question of tagging in sight. It is a very intrusive measure and we are not convinced that it will necessarily be, in current terms, as effective as hotels, but I take the point the noble Baroness made and will continue to look into it further.

[Lord Faulkner of Worcester (Lab)]

My Lords, there is a great deal in the Minister’s answers and the initial Statements with which I totally agree, particularly his statement about the threats to leading medical figures and leaders of the vaccine movement. Anti-vaxxers are a vile section of our community and I hope everything can be done to stop their activities. I also strongly welcome, as the grandfather of a teenage girl, the decision to vaccinate schoolchildren. She is delighted by that. It means she can go on holiday properly with her parents. It will make a great deal of difference to her and I know she will support it.

However, the aspect of the Minister’s answer with which I was not happy—he will know what I am going to say because I have raised this before, although not for a while in the Chamber—is the wearing of face coverings. The message is confused and the advice being given to the public is not clear. It is not made easier by photographs appearing in the press of the Cabinet sitting around a table close together with not a single face covering in sight, and pictures of at least half the Chamber in the House of Commons where virtually all the Members are unmasked. It is not the same in this House: face coverings are being worn by the great majority on all sides of the Chamber when we are not speaking. We do this not just for our own benefit and that of our immediate neighbours but for the benefit of the staff who work here. That perhaps deserves rather higher consideration in the House of Commons.

The advice being given to travellers is very difficult. Again, I would have liked earlier, much stronger advice. At present, it is mandatory if you are travelling on a Transport for London conveyance—a Tube, tram or bus—to wear a mask, but on other forms of transport, it is advisory. There is great confusion, and it gives rise to resentment among people following what they think is government advice to wear a face covering. Can we have from the Government a bit more clarity on when they believe face coverings should be worn, because I think the public are not clear about it at all?