Covid-19 Update

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Tuesday 9th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

What the public want to see, in Stourbridge and across the whole UK, is people working together to defeat this virus. Some of the measures have to be tough, and some are difficult, but it is all done with the goal of getting this country through this as well as we possibly can, so that we can lift as many of these measures as soon as we safely can. That balance between pace and safety is central to the judgments ahead. I want to thank everybody in Stourbridge and say to them that there is no politics in this; the only thing that is important is the safety of the people of Stourbridge.

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab) [V]]

I am grateful to all those working together—the GPs, Queen Mary University of London, the Royal London Hospital, Tower Hamlets Council, the London Muslim Centre and others—in my constituency to make sure that people get vaccinated. As Members have heard, vaccine take-up is lower among minority communities and some other vulnerable groups. Some 77% of white residents are getting vaccinated, which is great, whereas only just over half of Asian residents and under 46% of black residents in our borough are getting vaccinated. Will the Secretary of State commit to increasing the supply of vaccines to our GP surgeries, as they are saying that this is where they can make a big difference with vaccine take-up? This would make a big difference to the death rates and the dangers that these minority communities face, in my constituency and elsewhere in the country.

[Matt Hancock]

I want to praise the hon. Lady for the leadership she is showing locally in driving up those vaccination rates. The fewer people who are left unprotected by the jab, the safer we will all be, both individually and in communities in London and across the country. My hon. Friend the Minister for Covid Vaccine Deployment is leading the efforts in this space, and I will make sure he gets in contact so that we can work together to reassure everybody that the vaccine is the right thing for you and the right thing for your community.