Angela Eagle
Main Page: Angela Eagle (Labour - Wallasey)Department Debates - View all Angela Eagle's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
(3 years, 6 months ago)
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Helen Whately
I thank my right hon. Friend for his intervention. I will come on to the impact and detail of the rationale for the interventions.
Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
Does the Minister agree that as the virus is coming roaring back, particularly in areas such as my constituency, now is the wrong time to be getting rid of the furlough, and that if we are going to have extra restrictions, we also really need much greater extra support so that we can compensate and look after business owners and individuals that have to self-isolate or close?
Helen Whately
The hon. Lady makes an important point about the impact of restrictions on people’s livelihoods as well as their lives. However, she is asking me to stray beyond my brief as a Health Minister to talk about the financial support, although she will be aware that the furlough has supported huge numbers of people during the period of lockdown and since, and the Chancellor has introduced further measures to support people in the months ahead.
Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
We all want to fight to get the virus down and save lives, but to do so we have to have coherent and transparent rules from the Government that are simple and that everyone can understand, and that certainly do not run to 10 pages. We must have an effective test and trace system. We have to understand—I hope that the Minister will take this back to the Government—that we cannot get the virus down by lockdowns on the cheap. It makes no sense to withdraw the support that kept everybody going earlier in the year while the pandemic is coming back and still raging in our communities.
We need the Government to look very quickly at the support that they can give to the areas that they decide need extra restrictions. On the Wirral, we have 31,000 jobs still furloughed. Furlough comes to an end in three weeks’ time, just as the extra lockdown restrictions that this SI introduces are closing down and making unviable a lot more of our local jobs and businesses. In order for us to support the Government and join the battle to get the virus down, they must increase support for individuals who need to self-isolate when test and trace is fixed. They must support businesses that are forced to close or operate at a much lower profit levels or unprofitably, through no fault of their own, because of the restrictions that the Government have imposed. They must give extra support to local authorities and statutory services that have to maintain the ongoing capacity to act. On the Wirral, we have over 15,000 people who had to shield during the initial phases of the pandemic. In the past four months, the Wirral food bank has seen a 51% increase in the support that it gives to 65,000 people—71 tonnes of food. The Government must support us to do the right thing if we are to get the virus down.