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

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Wednesday 4th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, this is not the first time I have said in this Chamber that the Government need to fundamentally rethink their position. We are asked to believe that the rate can be pushed down by closing churches, John Lewis, bookshops, gyms and swimming pools but leaving open Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Marks & Spencer and the Co-op. I have very good news for the noble Baroness, Lady Smith. My wife was in the Cambridge branch of M&S yesterday to buy some tights before lockdown; they assured her that they would be packing as many clothes as possible into the grocery section so that it would still be possible to buy tights and so on. Are this Government sponsored by Amazon or by Deliveroo? Which is it, or is it both?

Some 40,000 people have died, and we are now told that another 80,000 are going to die. What have we been doing for the last six months? The Government need to go back to the drawing board and call in people such as Professor Heneghan and other scientists to look more carefully at the numbers.

I recently spent four days in Stockholm. They have the same problem as we do, but they have dealt with it very differently. Stockholm has not locked down its economy; the death rate is lower than ours and it is managing to carry on. A lot of sensible social distancing precautions are in place; most of the museums are closed, but not the economy. As you walk around, you do not get this feeling of dread, with everybody looking like frightened little mice. I ask the Government to look at resetting their strategy.

My final point is this. If there is a vaccine, the consequences will still have to be dealt with. The virus might well mutate. After all, the flu virus mutates—you need a flu jab every year. We seem to be talking about a vaccine as though it will come down from heaven like manna, we will consume it and we will be protected for ever. It will not work that way. The virus will manage to mutate, and we will have this problem with us for a very long time.

At the beginning of this debate, the noble Lord, Lord Robathan, talked about causing national self-harm. I honestly believe that we are talking ourselves into a corner because we are refusing to consider the basis on which we are working. That basis is wrong and it needs to be looked at again.