Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions) (England) (No. 4) Regulations 2020

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Wednesday 4th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

Like the noble Baroness, Lady Jolly, I will actually be addressing the statutory instrument, the Minister will be pleased to hear. In a way, these Benches are probably the least of his problems tonight. I do not expect that he is thanking his clutch of colleagues who, for one reason or another, are trying to stop these important regulations or have regrets. Of course, most of the regrets are perfectly legitimate questions to be asked and concerns to be raised, which is actually the point of the debate. Putting down an amendment to the Motion to double your speaking time seems a bit iffy to me.

On behalf of these Benches, I will not be commenting further on the amendments to the Motion, which I think are based mostly on internal Conservative Party arguments. We will abstain if any of the five noble Lords move to a Division. As for the noble Lord, Lord Robathan, we know that he has form—possibly a quasi-herd immunity supporter, I wonder, who disregards the science which at present tells us that such abandonment of restrictions might mean many deaths until we have a cure or a vaccine. We know the noble Lord’s intemperate views are not those of his own Government. If he tests the opinion of the House tonight, we will vote against his amendment. Frankly, this is too important for the whole country to play games, like the noble Lord, Lord Robathan, and those who support him.

As my right honourable friend Sir Keir Starmer and my honourable friend Jon Ashworth have made clear in the past few days, these Benches have major concerns over the Government’s decision-making, communications and messaging, and it is of the greatest importance that we have far more clarity about what is to be done during lockdown II and its exit route, as my noble friend Lord Rooker said.

We have been offering to work with the Government for months. Indeed, yesterday in the House of Commons my honourable friend Rosena Allin-Khan MP asked the Minister Nadine Dorries five or six times about working together to deal with the mental health pandemic. She got a very rude brush-off from that Minister—not at all the kind of behaviour we would expect from our Minister.

This afternoon, the House is invited to endorse the Prime Minister’s decision to impose upon the whole country a deep, restrictive lockdown for which the exit strategy is still unclear. As the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster confirmed on Sunday, it could stretch beyond four weeks. On these Benches, we have argued very strongly that the previous lockdown was the time when we could have got the vital systems, particularly test and trace, in place and rebuilt the vital local capacity that has been so foolishly run down by years of cuts and hostility to local government. This time we hope that the Government will not only recognise the crucial role of local knowledge and expertise but will fund local authorities as they have promised. We have at least to flag up that one day there will have to be a reckoning for the absurd way that contracts have been handed out to private organisations in a manner more reminiscent of a banana republic.

As Keir Starmer has made clear, Labour supports the introduction of national measures to slow down the spread of the virus. This is an approach that he made weeks ago on the emergence of evidence on 21 September, as my noble friends Lord Hunt and Lord Knight said, and for which he and the Labour Party received abuse from the Government and some of their supporters in the media. I think we are entitled to point out that the initial reaction of the Government was to do too little, too late; their shambolic press conference on Sunday was a graphic illustration of that. The cost of inaction is an inevitable harder lockdown now, as my noble friend Lady Andrews said.

Labour will support what the evidence required all along. Of course, here and in the other place, the details will be subject to scrutiny, which is our job. As the noble Baroness, Lady Jolly, said, we are at least debating these regulations four or five hours before the lockdown into comes into place, which is definite progress. We will join the Government in delivering the message that everyone has to play their part, abide by the rules and bring the rate of infection down. The Government are rightly saying that lockdown II may not end on 2 December but, like other noble Lords, I ask the Minister: what is the strategy for exiting this lockdown? Are we really going to go back to the three tiers that did not appear to work in the first place?

Above all, we have to have ready a proper world-class find, test, trace, isolate and support system. There have been so many months of unfulfilled promises on this, but it will have disastrous implications if we do not get it right. It is that case that our hospitals are filling up. Almost 11,000 people are now in hospital. Does the Minister feel that that will end if we bring the nationwide R rate to less than one?

I make a final plea for those who have people in care homes. Mistakes were made in the first wave of the pandemic. Families will be anxious to know that their loved ones in care homes will be protected as infections rise, but keeping care home residents safe should not mean locking residents up and keeping them away from the people who care about them, so can the Minister guarantee that families will be able to visit care homes during this lockdown and that they will be treated as key workers with access to regular testing so that they can visit their loved ones safely?