Public Health

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Wednesday 30th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I also pay tribute to those working on the frontline, particularly at the moment at the Homerton hospital in the heart of my constituency, which is experiencing a very high pressure of new covid cases coming in, and the Royal London, where I lived for nine weeks with one of my children when they were very sick, which is also experiencing huge pressure and serves my constituency well as well. I also want to pay tribute to Hackney council staff, in particular those who empty our bins and keep our streets clean and our parks nice. Our public realm has risen to the occasion, which is an odd thing to say in covid, but we always had clean streets and good parks. They have done a sterling job and kept us going through the dark days of lockdown.

Hackney and the City—we were linked with the City for health purposes—were already in tier 4 and have been since before Christmas. Our cases are now more than 850 per 100,000, which is an exponential increase when we look back to 25 November when we were at 124 per 100,000. Just before we went into tier 4 we were at just over 500 cases per 100,000. It is a very serious matter and had this been a month ago, when we were at 124, I would perhaps have been arguing a slightly different case. So on public health grounds I back tier 4 and I suspect—I hope that the Minister will be honest—that there will be a tier 5 or some further lockdown if this new strain keeps replicating at the rate it is doing, and of course if any other new strains arrive. We all pray that no strain becomes apparent that will affect our children worse than they are already affected.

I do have concerns—very big concerns—about how the Government have handled this. We have had mixed messages. The schools announcements today and just before the recess were all over the place. Half-announcements are made, but no detailed information is available. If we press a question, we get nothing back. It is great when the House is sitting, so theoretically we can hold Ministers to account, but too often we get no answers. At times we have online briefings, but—I say this with respect for the Minister, who is a good Minister and tries hard—they are short; they are not enough. We cannot get hundreds of colleagues on and get their questions answered. As MPs in our area, we need information to be able to answer the questions that are already flying in from headteachers not knowing what is going on with schools next week, with our rates so high but our schools still open. Of course I and local headteachers want our schools open, but why are they open when schools in neighbouring boroughs with similar rates are closed? It is very confusing.

We also need clarity about where the transmission is coming from. What I understand from public health briefings—I am sure the Minister will elaborate—is that it is largely community-driven. The community driver goes into schools, from where it then spreads. We need to be really clear about that, because, judging by a number of emails I have had in the past couple of days, teachers and headteachers are frightened about what next week will bring. They need clarity and certainty. They are vital frontline key workers, doing their best to educate our children in difficult circumstances.

I completely agree with the hon. Member for East Devon (Simon Jupp) about the business issues. My local hospitality industry has been decimated. The 10 pm curfew seems to have been plucked from the air, because it became 11 pm only about six weeks later. Again, we need clarity. If it is not clear, or the decision is a subjective one, fine, but level with the British public and the industries affected—the events industry, the creative industries. Tell them, engage them, get them into Government earlier. When I talk to permanent secretaries, as I often do on the Public Accounts Committee, and ask them who they are engaging with, I get vague answers, but actually sometimes they do not have the right people in the room. However brilliant and clever our civil servants are, they need to be talking to people on the frontline, because in the end who is delivering the tests in schools? It is the headteachers and staff. Who is at the frontline in hospitals? It is not civil servants; it is our health workers, and we need to listen to them.

I am concerned about the frontline impact in the NHS. Earlier, I raised with the Secretary of State the number of nurses who are potentially able to work and want to—about 71,000 of them, yet only 1,000 got through the system. Frontline nurses from various parts of the country, not just Hackney, have told me that they are struggling to get to the right place to contribute.

In short, we need proper economic support for the businesses that are closed. We need proper testing in place, and that must be worked on with the organisations that will have to deliver testing. We need clarity on testing and in the messaging. Above all, we need honesty—honesty about the route out. We need to treat the British public with the respect they deserve by providing information and explanation when it is not clear. That is enough. People understand that difficult decisions have to be made, sometimes at the last minute, but people need to know if something is coming down the line. People in government always think they need to have a definite decision or a definite point of view to put out there, but actually, in this situation, people can sense what is coming and the Government need to be much more honest about that. I hope the Minister will respond when she winds up the debate.