Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (England) Regulations 2020

Lord Wei Excerpts

Tuesday 12th May 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wei (Con)]

My Lords, I want to sort of start my comments by congratulating the Government and the police on showing incredible restraint in acting under huge pressure in what has been an incredibly difficult period. The amendments to these regulations are welcome because they start to allow people to get more exercise and get the economy going. It is easy for us out here to sort of criticise, but I congratulate the Minister on what he and his team have been doing under huge pressure.

The Prime Minister has talked about the importance of common sense, and we now need to start thinking about these regulations and our whole approach to the response to Covid, using common sense, and involving other parties in this. I would be keen to hear from the Minister how we can start to involve the public in the way that these regulations evolve moving forward. For example, there is data at a local level about how many people are infected with Covid. Instead of using law and regulations all the time to shape behaviour, which can be a crude instrument, are there ways almost to gamify and allow citizens to understand the situation in their local area, understand what might be causing it locally and start to adapt their behaviour according to where they are, in the country or in a city such as London?

Secondly, understandably, we have had to bring in these regulations, but they are a huge infringement on civil liberties. So far we have had to take into account the needs of the NHS and public health in shaping these regulations, but do we also need to think about the enforceability of these regulations and laws? For example, on the new change that will allow people to meet one other person from outside the household, do we believe that the police have the resources to check every time they see people in the park whether an additional member has joined that household or whether they are part of the same family? Could we not start to work together with experts in this House, in the police and in the legal system, to shape laws based on natural law and common-law principles that are more tailored and risk-based? For example, we do not seem to have the resources to shut down large gatherings when they appear, so how will we be able to focus on policing individual families?

Moving forward, we will need to have a much wider debate to shape these laws, rather than the Government generating and issuing them and noble Lords in this House commenting around the edges. It feels as though we need to move forward and create these regulations together.