Covid-19: Restrictions

Lord Robathan Excerpts

Thursday 7th January 2021 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Robathan]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the success of the restrictions introduced to address the Covid-19 pandemic in reducing the transmission of Covid-19 between 1 July and 31 December 2020.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Lord Bethell) (Con)]

My Lords, the science of virus transmission is very simple: tiny bugs spread by contact and by breath. Lockdowns work because they put space between people, but there are costs—horrible costs. That is why each day we publish gigabytes of data on infection rates, we analyse the patterns and we design lockdowns to have the maximum impact for the lowest economic and social cost.

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

My Lords, yes, but: in the last few months we have seen ever more stringent restrictions—tiers 3 and 4, the failed circuit breaker in Wales, a second lockdown which ended only just over a month ago, and now a third lockdown—yet cases keep rising. The Prime Minister said on “The Andrew Marr Show” on Sunday that the evidence is not clear. We all want to see policy based on empirical evidence, so please, can the Minister go back to the department and instigate a detailed examination of why these hugely damaging restrictions have not seen a reduction in infections, hospitalisations and deaths?

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I am extremely grateful to my noble friend for that sage advice. I can reassure him that lockdowns do work—in Leicester, Bolton, Luton, Liverpool—and I can give him very clear case studies of how specific measures have affected national, regional and local outbreak infection rates. The truth is that tier 3 was enough for the original variant, but it is not enough for the new variant, which is 70% more transmittable. That has hit our country hard, which is why we have to have this new, horrible lockdown.