Category Archives: uk politics

Nigel Farage Gets Fact-Checked By The Home Office Over ‘Incorrect’ Migrant Covid Claims

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Nigel Farage has been called out by the Home Office over a tweet in which he claimed 12 migrants arriving in Dover on Saturday had tested positive for coronavirus.

The Reform UK leader detailed what he described as a “Covid crisis” and called on home secretary Priti Patel to “get a grip”.

But hours later the Home Office refuted the claim, saying none of the people referred to by Farage had tested positive.

“This is incorrect,” it said in a tweet. “None of these 12 people tested positive for Covid-19. All adults who arrived today have been tested for Covid-19.”

Four small boats in total carrying 87 people including children made the dangerous Channel crossing into the UK on Saturday.

The Home Office has said all adults who arrived in Dover were tested for Covid-19, and only one person tested positive.

It is not known how Farage obtained the false information and his tweet is yet to be deleted.

HuffPost UK has contacted Reform UK for comment.

Elsewhere, a new study last week found those who support Reform UK are the least likely to take up the offer of a coronavirus jab.

Only 53.7% of those planning to vote for Reform UK favour taking the vaccine, a two-wave study by Oxford University found.

This contrasts dramatically to over 90% for supporters of the Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal Democrats, at 94.8%, 91.4% and 92.1% respectively, and 100% for those who intend to vote for the SNP.

People who did not know who they would vote for were less likely to take the vaccine at 82.6%, as were supporters of the Green Party at 77.4%.

The study found strong relationships between political attitudes and intention to accept the jab, with whether you voted for Brexit also appearing related to vaccine acceptance, according to Oxford researchers.

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Who Is Accountable For Kemi Badenoch’s Public Attack On Our Journalist?

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Some people call it “cancel culture”. Others call it accountability. Rightly or wrongly, your Twitter feed can get you in trouble at work, or worse. But we’ve now learned that members of our government are not held to the same standards as the rest of us.

It’s almost a month since Britain’s equalities minister posted an eight-tweet thread filled with false allegations about the conduct of HuffPost reporter Nadine White. Nadine had asked Kemi Badenoch, as one of parliament’s most senior Black MPs and the minister with the portfolio for race and inequality, why she hadn’t appeared in a video aimed at increasing uptake of the vaccine among Black people. She emailed the MP’s office, and the Treasury press team, where Badenoch also holds a ministerial role. Rather than respond via either of those channels, the minister fired off a Twitter tirade about how this routine press enquiry was a “sad insight into how some journalists operate”, describing it as “creepy and bizarre”. Nadine was forced to lock her Twitter account after she received abuse.

It took us a couple of hours to file a formal complaint with the Cabinet Office. It took them three and a half weeks to reply, but at last the government has seen fit to answer our complaint. 

Their letter is short and to the point. “I note that the tweets were not issued from a government Twitter account but instead from a personal Twitter account,” writes Cabinet Office permanent secretary Alex Chisholm. “The minister is personally responsible for deciding how to act and conduct herself, and for justifying her own actions and conduct. As such, this is a matter on which the minister would be best placed to offer a response.”

The ministerial code states that “ministers of the Crown are expected to maintain high standards of behaviour and to behave in a way that upholds the highest standards of propriety”. But not, it seems, on their ministerial Twitter accounts. 

We were not alone in mistakenly thinking that the minister’s verified Twitter account, in which she describes herself as “Treasury & Equalities Minister”, was in some way linked to her job

How stupid of us. It is cold comfort that we were not alone in mistakenly thinking that the minister’s verified Twitter account, in which she describes herself as “Treasury & Equalities Minister”, was in some way linked to her job. The National Union of Journalists called Badenoch’s original outburst about Nadine “frankly weird, completely out of order and an abuse of her privilege”. The Council of Europe’s Safety of Journalists Platform flagged the incident as a potential threat to media freedom under the European Convention on Human Rights. The European Centre for Press and Media Freedom, recorded the attack as a “violation of media freedom”. I wonder how many of Kemi Badenoch’s 40,000 followers are also under the impression that her Twitter account is a reflection of her professional role and work as an elected representative.

Also mistaken was No.10’s race adviser Samuel Kasumu, who was so upset about Kemi Badenoch’s behaviour that he handed in, but was then persuaded to withdraw, his resignation. Apparently unaware of that Kemi Badenoch’s official parliamentary Twitter account is only “personal”, he wrote: “I believe the Ministerial Code was breached. However, more concerning than the act was the lack of response internally. It was not OK or justifiable, but somehow nothing was said. I waited, and waited, for something from the senior leadership team to even point to an expected standard, but it did not materialise.”

Nadine is a reporter who has done crucial work for HuffPost UK on racial inequality in the UK, not least during the Covid pandemic. So it’s just as well that it was not in a ministerial capacity, but from her “personal Twitter account”, that the minister for equalities made a show of not understanding how news works. Had she only had her professional hat on, she might have remembered that journalists send literally hundreds of requests for comment every day to every institution in the UK in order to find out if a story is accurate. We don’t publish stories without doing this – indeed, no story was published in this case.

It is a little confusing that Kemi Badenoch published screenshots of messages sent to her professional address and the Treasury press office in a “personal” capacity. But it’s certainly a relief that, when she declared to her 39,000 followers that Nadine’s conduct was a “sad insight into how some journalists operate”, and accused HuffPost and Nadine of “looking to sow distrust”, she wasn’t speaking as a government minister – because these claims are not only unbecoming of a senior politician, but betray either an alarming ignorance of how the press fits into our democratic system or a cynical display of bad faith.

In the end, Kemi Badenoch broke her silence by contacting a journalist – not Nadine or anyone from HuffPost, but a reporter at her local paper, the Saffron Walden Reporter. In a statement, she repeated her defamatory allegations about Nadine, this time claiming we had “stoked” a “false story” on social media, claims that were withdrawn from publication when it was pointed out that there was no evidence for them.

This apparently did not trouble her ministerial employers in the Cabinet Office or No.10. Perhaps they might like to clarify whether someone is speaking in an official capacity when they begin a statement with the words “as Equalities Minister”. 

It is absurd to any reasonable person to suggest the words of a minister are somehow less accountable if they are written by them on Twitter than a press release, or were given in an interview.

So who is responsible for the actions of the government’s ministers, if not the government? The Cabinet Office was clear: “This is a matter on which the minister would be best placed to offer a response.” No.10 agreed, with the prime minister’s press secretary saying it was “a matter for Kemi Badenoch” –although she added: “That would not be how we in No.10 would deal with these things.” 

Kemi Badenoch’s office, however, does not agree that it her responsibility, telling Nadine this week: “She has nothing further to add beyond what is included in the letter sent earlier today from Alex Chisholm to your editor.” The same Alex Chisholm who made it very clear it was for her to respond.

This story is not just about a government machine that is out of touch with the realities of our digital lives. It is absurd to any reasonable person to suggest that the words of a minister are somehow less accountable if they are written by them on Twitter than if they appeared in a press release, or were given in an interview. If any member of the public were to tweet out emails sent to their work address, accompanied by a slew of false allegations, they would expect a swift call from HR. Indeed, someone might like to tell transport secretary Grant Shapps, who formally announces weekly updates to the government’s travel and quarantine policies through his own Twitter account, whose handle he literally read out in Parliament. 

The ministerial code, which the government concluded Kemi Badenoch had not breached with her public attack on a journalist doing her job, is built around the loftily-titled Seven Principles of Public Life. Hopefully ministers are asked to read it when they enter office. “Accountability,” reads one principle. “Holders of public office are accountable for their decisions and actions and must submit themselves to whatever scrutiny necessary to ensure this.”

We’re a long way from David Cameron’s famously cringeworthy comment that “too many tweets might make a twat” – ministers of Kemi Badenoch’s generation are all too aware of how useful a platform Twitter is for their political and personal profile. But where they are rightly accountable for their conduct as elected representatives elsewhere in their lives, this effectively allows them impunity online.

The Cabinet Office themselves “noted” to us in their response that “the prime minister’s press secretary has already provided comments on this matter”, suggesting a tacit endorsement of their belief that this is not how a minister should behave. But both institutions apparently felt it was not their place to get involved.

Like a parent banning their teenager’s laptop but leaving them with a phone, Whitehall feels dangerously out of touch in providing such an obvious loophole. Remember next time you see a prospective candidate or councillor cancelled online for tweets they sent at university – our government ministers are allowed to say whatever they like.

Jess Brammar is editor-in-chief of HuffPost UK. Follow her on Twitter @jessbrammar

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Exclusive: Government Blocking Covid Families’ Access To Justice Using Threat Of Costs

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The government has been accused of using money as a way of blocking access to justice for bereaved Covid families.

Human rights lawyer Elkan Abrahamson says the government is using punitive costs orders to stymie the ability of thousands of grieving families to fight for a public inquiry into the handling of the pandemic.

“They’re opposing everyone who’s raising these issues and saying: ‘You’re going to have to pay us a fortune in costs if you lose,’” he said.

“They’re using money as a way of blocking access to justice. That’s what it boils down to.”

Abrahamson, who is head of major inquiries at Broudie Jackson Canter law firm, is acting for Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice in bringing legal action against the government.

The group of about 2,500 families is launching judicial review proceedings to try to compel the government to hold a public inquiry.

But before doing so they have been forced to raise substantial sums of money to cover the legal costs they could be forced to pay the government if the action is not successful.

Abrahamson said the government had refused to waive costs when asked by the campaign, but had also declined to tell the group how much it could seek to claim.

Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice began fundraising and has now got enough money to continue with its bid, which is expected to progress in the near future.

A separate case has shown the significant risks of bringing such legal challenges.

Earlier this month, the government asked for costs of up to £1m in a case brought by the Good Law Project for a judicial review over the award of contracts for personal protective equipment.

The action meant the small, not-for-profit organisation, which is funded by donations from the public, could have been liable for “eye-watering” costs if it lost the case.

“We cannot bear this kind of existential risk,” said Jolyon Maugham QC, director of Good Law Project.

The group applied to the High Court for a cost capping order to restrict the legal costs of both sides, which was granted on February 24.

It had asked for a cap of £100,000 but instead the order was granted at £250,000.

“If we lose the case, we are liable to pay a quarter of a million pounds to government, as well as needing to cover our own legal costs,” said Maugham. 

“Despite huge support from members of the public, generous individuals and organisations, we are still short.”  

Abrahamson said one compelling reason for holding a public inquiry into the pandemic is that the option of pursuing inquest proceedings has been effectively closed off to most families in relation to Covid-19 deaths.

“The coroners are very, very reluctant to actually look into anything more,” he said. “The guidance says if there’s an individual failing you can point to that leads to someone getting Covid, maybe they could look at it, but if it’s a generic failing, you can’t look at it.”

Deaths in relation to care home failings, failure to provide PPE, failings in the 111 system and delays in lockdown all fall outside this remit.

“The chief coroner has said there will be a [public] inquiry, but there isn’t one, that’s the problem,” said Abrahamson.

His firm is dealing with about 150 clients who want inquests to be held into the deaths of their loved ones.

But only five or six of these have actually moved forward to pre-inquest hearings, Abrahamson said.

HuffPost UK has approached the Cabinet Office for comment.

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Only 1% Of UK Arrivals Are Being Made To Quarantine In Hotels

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Only 1% of people arriving in the UK every day are required to quarantine in government-approved hotels, the Border Force director has revealed.

Speaking to the Commons home affairs committee on Wednesday, Paul Lincoln said “about” 14,000 or 15,000 people were coming into the country per day, which was “95% down” on the usual number for this time of year.

From February 15, people arriving from 33 “red list” countries including Portugal and South Africa have had to spend 10 days in isolation in hotels.

Lincoln said on average 150 people per day were being placed into the facilities.

Arrivals who are not required to quarantine in hotels must self-isolate at home. Lincoln told MPs the compliance with home isolation was “at least 85%”.

Amid concerns about new variants of Covid being imported into the UK, the Border Force director said the number of people arriving with coronavirus was “substantially lower” than 0.5% of the domestic case rate.

But Lincoln was unable to give a precise figure, saying Public Health England (PHE) would be publishing the number “in due course”.

Committee chair and Labour MP Yvette Cooper said the figures showed there was a “very leaky system” of quarantine.

Under England’s current national lockdown, international travel is illegal apart from in some limited circumstances.

But Boris Johnson’s roadmap for lifting the restrictions, announced on Monday, could see international travel could start as early as May 17.

It would need to be approved by a new “Global Travel Taskforce” that is being set up by the government to assess the risk of importing new variants of the virus from overseas.

Priti Patel, the home secretary, told the committee on Tuesday it was “far too early” for people to book holidays abroad.

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Ending Lockdown Too Fast Risks New Covid Variants Emerging, Top Scientist Warns

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

A security guard holds a sign at Blackburn Cathedral, which is being used as a mass vaccination center during the coronavirus outbreak in Blackburn. 

Ending Covid lockdown restrictions too swiftly could run the risk of new vaccine-resistant variants taking hold, top expert Sarah Gilbert has said. 

Speaking to MPs on Wednesday, Oxford University’s professor of vaccinology also warned relaxing restrictions too quickly could boost transmission of the virus. 

It comes after Boris Johnson this week revealed his roadmap out of lockdown, with a pledge to end all social distancing by June 21. 

Gilbert has urged caution, however, telling the Commons’ science and technology committee: “To make sure that we have the lowest chance possible of new variants arising we need to prevent the virus from transmitting between people and we’re now doing that very effectively with the vaccines.”

She added: “We cannot allow only the vaccines to do all the work of protecting the population, while at the current time in the UK we still have relatively high levels of transmission.

“And there is a danger that if measures are lifted too quickly that transmission could increase, and that puts us at a greater risk of selection of new variants that are not so well effectively neutralised by the virus.

“It wouldn’t be all or nothing but it could be a significant change, and we want to minimise the chances of that happening as much as we possibly can.”

Anthony Harnden, deputy chair of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) agreed “it’s really, really important that we don’t rush this”. 

He said: “I refer back to my original answer about vaccination not being the only way out pandemic.

PA

Prime minister Boris Johnson leaves 10 Downing Street

“We must go slowly, and the reason is because we want to keep transmission down and we want to keep infection rates down. And if we don’t, we will lose all the benefits of those vaccines that we’ve acquired and in the last few months because we will get the environment for new variant strains to emerge and have ‘vaccine escape’. So it’s really, really important that we don’t rush this.”

Schools are scheduled to reopen on March 8, followed by relaxations of some social distancing measures later in the month. 

Non-essential shops, pubs, restaurants, hairdressers and gyms will reopen no earlier than April 12 in the prime minister’s phased plan.

Johnson is under pressure from backbench Tory MPs in the Covid Recovery Group, who have been demanding the government speeds up the plan. 

The PM has argued, however, that England is taking a “cautious but irreversible” path out of lockdown. 

Scientists are still examining new data about how effective the vaccines are in reducing transmission and hospitalisations. 

Philip Dormitzer, vice president and chief scientific officer of viral vaccines at Pfizer, said the company believes its vaccine will protect against the variants seen to date.

He told the committee: “From real world effectiveness data, both UK and in Israel where the UK variant is common, we’re starting to get our first direct evidence, and we are seeing protection against the UK variant that is equivalent to the protection we saw in controlled trials before that variant was circulating.

“For other variants at this point we have to rely more on laboratory data, and the laboratory data thus far, I would say are quite reassuring.

“We do see with the South African variant some reduction in the level of neutralisation.

“So yes these mutations can reduce the level of neutralisation, but they do not reduce the level of neutralisation anywhere near as low as neutralisation that was observed at the time that people were protected in the trial.

“So we think it is likely that the vaccine will protect against the variants that we have seen to date, but the way to be sure is of course the real world data because laboratory measures of immunity cannot be translated directly to known protection –  that requires actually observing protection in the field.”

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Vaccine Passports For Pubs And Theatres To Be Reviewed

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Boris Johnson has said Michael Gove will lead a government review into the possible use of vaccine passports for entry into venues such as pubs and theatres.

The prime minister said Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, would ask for the “best scientific, moral, philosophical, ethical viewpoints” before reaching a conclusion.

But speaking to broadcasters on Tuesday, the day after unveiling his roadmap for ending England’s lockdown, Johnson said there were “deep and complex” ethical issues involved in introducing domestic vaccine passports.

“We’ve never thought in terms of having something that you have to show to go to a pub or a theatre,” he said.

“We can’t be discriminatory against people who for whatever reason can’t have the vaccine, there might be medical reasons why people can’t have a vaccine.”

He said when it came to foreign travel there was “no question” a lot of countries would demand proof people had received a Covid vaccine before being allowed entry.

“It’s going to come on the international stage whatever,” he said.

In December, Gove ruled out the introduction of vaccine passports. “I certainly am not planning to introduce any vaccine passports, and I don’t know anyone else in government who is,” he told Sky News.

Asked if there was a possibility they could be introduced, he added: “No.”

Johnson also said on Tuesday he was “very optimistic” that he will be able to ease all the restrictions by the June 21 target date.

But he said “nothing can be guaranteed” and warned the date could slip if people were not “prudent and continue to follow the guidance in each stage”.

“Some people will say that we’re going to be going too fast, some people will say we’re going too slow,” he added.

“I think the balance is right, I think it is a cautious but irreversible approach, which is exactly what people want to see.”

The relaxing of rules is heavily dependent on the progress of the vaccination programme. 

Matt Hancock, the health secretary, told BBC Radio 4′s Today programme the government is working “incredibly hard” to ensure as many people as possible receive a jab.

“We want to see that vaccine uptake go as high as possible. But it’s absolutely on all of us to come forward and get the vaccine. It’s the right thing to do,” he said.

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No.10 Dismisses Claims Carrie Symonds Has A ‘Central Role’ In Government

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Photo by Chris Jackson – WPA Pool/Getty Images

Britain’s prime minister Boris Johnson with partner Carrie Symonds

Downing Street has dismissed suggestions that Boris Johnson’s fiancée Carrie Symonds is playing a “central role” in governing the country.

The prime minister’s press secretary Allegra Stratton described such claims as “incorrect”, pointing out that Symonds is on maternity leave and is due to take up a new job as head of communications for the Aspinall Foundation.

It came after the Bow Group, a Tory think-tank, called for an inquiry to determine her role in “governing” the UK, amid concern over her influence in No.10.

Symonds has become embroiled in a storm of briefings about a power struggle between competing factions inside No.10 after two of her allies, Baroness Finn and Henry Newman, were appointed as key Downing Street advisers.

Their appointments were followed by the resignation last week of former Vote Leave staffer and Dominic Cummings ally Oliver Lewis as head of No.10’s union unit, amid claims that the PM accused him of briefing journalists against Symonds’ ally Newman.

Key Johnson adviser Lord Frost, who worked closely with Lewis on Brexit negotiations, was also given a surprise promotion to the cabinet as the power struggle played out last week.

Some anonymous sources have briefed newspapers claiming Symonds’ influence hung over the wrangling.

But Stratton dismissed the claims.

Asked about the Bow Group’s suggestion that Symonds was playing a “central role in running the country, without any authority or accountability to do so”, Stratton told reporters: “It’s incorrect. The PM’s fiancée is on maternity leave, she’s raising their son Wilf and shortly she will be taking up a new role at wildlife charity the Aspinall Foundation.”

Stratton also stressed that the prime minister’s focus has been on the road map to lifting the coronavirus lockdown, which he will unveil on Monday.

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Outdoor Socialising ‘Pretty Safe’, Official Scientific Adviser Says

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Allowing families or friends to meet outside is “pretty safe” and will not contribute “much” to the spread of coronavirus, a government scientific adviser has said.

Sage member professor John Edmunds said allowing two households to meet outside would have little impact on the Covid R rate, which measures the number of people, on average, that each sick person will infect.

It comes amid reports that Boris Johnson will allow one-on-one outdoor meetings between different households in March and later wider gatherings of two households outside, to allow families to meet at Easter, when he sets out his plan to lift lockdown restrictions on Monday.

Asked if two households socialising outside was likely to have any effect on the R number, Edmunds told BBC One’s Andrew Marr Show: “Not much, mixing outside is pretty safe.”

It came as health secretary Matt Hancock said Covid restrictions will be eased step-by-step, with weeks in between each relaxation.

Schools are the government’s priority and are scheduled to open on March 8 and Hancock said the government wants to see what impact children returning to the classroom has on infection rates before significantly easing other restrictions.

He told Times Radio: “Hence there will be weeks between the steps so that we can watch carefully.”

Hancock also said social distancing measures and the wearing of face coverings are likely to continue but hinted that they may not be legally required once more people are vaccinated.

He added: “I want to see it more about personal responsibility over time as we have vaccinated more and more of the population.”

Edmunds, a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), warned that disruption would continue in schools until children were vaccinated.

The prime minister on Saturday set new targets for vaccinating all over-50s by April 15 and all British adults by the end of July but did not mention children.

Edmunds said: “I think there’s an argument for turning to children (in the vaccine rollout) as fast as we can.

“I mean, I have two children myself, they are in secondary schools and I think that there has been major disruption at schools and there will continue to be major disruption in schools until we have vaccinated our children.”

Edmunds also warned that reopening schools would likely increase the R number close to 1.

If it rises above 1, it means the epidemic is growing again in the UK.

As of Friday, R was estimated to be between 0.6 and 0.9.

Asked if he would be more comfortable opening primary schools and then secondary schools later, Edmunds said: “Obviously I’m just sticking to the epidemiology rather than other needs. 

“Of course there’s great needs to get our kids back in schools as fast as we can. 

“But sticking to the epidemiology, yeah, of course, it’s always safer to take smaller steps and evaluate.”

Meanwhile, leading Tory lockdown sceptic Mark Harper said all legal Covid restrictions should be lifted by the end of April when all over-50s will have been offered their first vaccine dose.

“We think at that point people should be able to get on with their lives,” the chair of the Covid Recovery Group told Marr.

“The government may still give them health advice and there may be things people do voluntarily, but the legal restrictions should fall away at the end of April.”

He rejected suggestions that restrictions should be kept in place simply to prevent the emergence of new variants, which have more chance of mutating the higher the rate of transmission.

Harper said: “The way you protect against variants is our fantastic genomic sequencing programme and the fact that all of our vaccine developers will respond to changes in the virus by altering the vaccine – that’s the way you protect against variants.

“If we are going to say we are so worried about a future variant that might not be susceptible to the vaccine, that’s a recipe for never unlocking our economy and our society, and I don’t think that’s really an acceptable proposition.”

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Keir Starmer Calls For ‘British Recovery Bond’ So Savers Can Invest In Post-Covid Recovery

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Keir Starmer has announced he would create a “British recovery bond” to help provide money for investment in communities, as he denied being too “soft” on Boris Johnson.

The Labour leader used a speech on Thursday to call for a new “partnership” between business and the state as the country rebuilds from the coronavirus crisis.

He said next month’s Budget represents a “fork in the road” for society, with a chance to reject the “insecure and unequal economy” of the past and “begin a new chapter in the history of our country”.

Starmer warned Conservative MPs “simply don’t believe that it’s the role of government to tackle inequality or insecurity”.

“I fear that the Conservatives are incapable of seizing this moment. That what we will get on March 3 will be short-term and it won’t even be a fix,” he said.

The Labour leader has been hit by criticism from his own side in recent weeks, with some MPs concerned he has not taken the fight to the government enough.

One MP on Labour’s left-wing told HuffPost UK of Starmer’s speech: “If that’s the new chapter then people won’t be rushing out to buy the book.”

But Starmer said while it was right to support the government when it took the correct action to deal with the pandemic, such as imposing lockdowns, “we have challenged them when we thought they were getting it wrong”.

“I don’t think that’s soft, I think that’s the national interest,” he said. “I think the public would say, in a time like this, you back the things that the government is doing right and you challenge things that you think they are getting wrong.”

Accusing the prime minister of setting out a “roadmap to yesterday”, Starmer said Labour would extend the furlough scheme, end the pay the freeze for key workers and not cut the £20 uplift to Universal Credit.

Labour said people investing their savings in its recovery bond would see it used to rebuild communities and supporting businesses across the country after the pandemic through the new National Infrastructure Bank.

The Bank of England has estimated that by June 2021 households will accumulate £250bn in savings. But it expected on only around 5% of the savings will be spent.

Starmer said his “British recovery bond” was a “longer-term, secure way of investing” for people to see a return on their investments that would also help “build the infrastructure of the future”.

He also said a Labour government would increase support available for new businesses to help create 100,000 start-ups over the next five years.

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Pubs Likely To Be Among Last To Reopen When Lockdown Ends, Says Boris Johnson

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Boris Johnson has hinted pubs, bars and other hospitality businesses will be the last to reopen when he lifts England’s lockdown in “stages”.

On Monday the prime minister is set to unveil his plan for the easing of restrictions over the coming months.

“It’ll be based firmly on a cautious and prudent approach to coming out of lockdown in such a way as to be irreversible,” he said on Wednesday. “We want to be going one way from now on based on the incredible vaccination rollout.”

Schools are expected to be the first part of society to reopen, with March 8 pencilled in as the earliest possible date.

Asked during a broadcast interview when the hospitality sector could be allowed to reopen in England, Johnson said: “I certainly think we need to go in stages. We need go cautiously.

“You perhaps remember last year we opened up hospitality fully as one of the last things we did. There is obviously an extra risk of transmission from hospitality.”

He added: “Just wait. We will try and say as much as we can on Monday.”

Dame Angela McLean, the chief scientific adviser at the Ministry of Defence, told MPs things were “all moving in the right direction” as infections are falling along with hospitalisation numbers and deaths.

But she also warned the lockdown should be lifted in a “cautious” way. “There’s still a lot of infected people out there,” she said.

The Daily Mail has reported ministers are weighing up allowing domestic holiday lets to open in time for the Easter weekend and that pubs could open in May, but with only two households permitted to mix indoors. According to the paper, the rule of six could then return for mixing inside by June.

Johnson’s comments came after NHS Providers chief executive Chris Hopson, who represents NHS trusts, said there was a “pretty clear view” the number of coronavirus infections needs to plummet to under 50,000 before lockdown should be eased.

The most recent estimate from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), released on Friday, suggested 695,400 people in England had Covid.

According to The Daily Telegraph cases would need to drop to 1,000 per day before lockdown could be softened, a figure suggested by former health secretary Jeremy Hunt earlier this month. 

On Tuesday 10,625 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus were confirmed in the UK, down from a peak of 68,053 on on January 8. The last time the infection rate was regularly below 1,000 a day was in August. 

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