Covid-19 Update

Michael Fabricant Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con) [V]]

My right hon. Friend has said time and again this morning that if people do not have symptoms, they should not get tested, because the antigen test does not work if someone does not have symptoms. Patrick McLoughlin—a good friend of ours, now in the House of Lords—always used to say to me, “If you want to keep a secret, say it in the Chamber of the House of Commons.” How can we get this message across with some snappy title, rather like the rule of six? It is very straightforward. How can we get across the message that if people do not have symptoms, it is pointless and a waste to go and get tested?

[Matt Hancock]

I can think of no better way in Lichfield than to get my hon. Friend out and about making that case—in a socially distanced way, of course. He is quite right. We have to get the message across, in the first instance to Members of this House, and I hope we are doing that today. We are also making clear in the communications around the process of getting a test that, if people do not have symptoms, they are not eligible. We are reviewing what more we might need to do, because we have to use our record testing capacity for the people who need it most.