Covid-19 Update

Martyn Day Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

That is an extremely clear and strong position from the Chair of the Select Committee. Of course we are expanding the current technologies. We have a plan, when we are on track for it, to get to 500,000 tests a day by the end of next month, on the current technologies. On the next generation of technologies, I am not going to put a figure on it because it depends on the technologies coming off. The very nature of backing new technologies is that we do not know which ones are going to be verified. That is why we have so many that are being piloted and so many with whom we are working. We have tests right now in Porton Down being verified. We want this to go as fast as we can, and we want it to go as large as we reasonably can, but we do not put a specific figure on it—we put all our weight and support behind this project, which will have the positive benefits that my right hon. Friend so eloquently sets out.

[Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP) [V]]

Yesterday we heard the Prime Minister describe his Operation Moonshot as the

“only hope for avoiding a second national lockdown”.

Already some experts have described this mass testing strategy as being fundamentally flawed. So does the Secretary of State think that the Prime Minister is gambling on something that the experts feel cannot be delivered?

On Tuesday, the Secretary of State failed to answer my hon. Friend the Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford) when she asked if it would be better to allow tests to be carried out locally and just move the samples around the UK instead of potentially infectious people. As he did not give an answer then, will he consider this now?

Finally, will the Secretary of State join me in welcoming the launch of Scotland’s Protect Scotland mobile tracing app yesterday? What update can he give the House on his own Government’s plans to release a similar app?

[Matt Hancock]

We have been working with the Scottish Government, as well as with the Welsh Government and the Northern Ireland Government, and actually Governments internationally, on an update on the app technology.

On the hon. Gentleman’s second point, that is simply a mischaracterisation of the policy. Of course we move samples around the country all the time. What we want to do, of course, is to continue to reduce the distance people have to travel. As I say, the average distance that people have to travel to get a test is 6.4 miles.

On the hon. Gentleman’s first point, there were, in the spring, some people who complained about my determination to expand our testing capacity at a record pace. We are hearing some of those voices again complaining that we want to increase testing. Both the SNP and Labour are making a huge mistake in opposing mass testing. It is an incredibly important tool in our arsenal.