Boris Johnson is blasted from all sides over winter lockdown: Labour claim draconian measures have come three weeks too late - while Tories slam PM for panicking and accuse SAGE experts of pressuring ministers into disastrous 'business-breaker'
- Boris Johnson bowed to pressure for a four-week national lockdown last night
- Sir Patrick Vallance warned deaths could be 'twice as bad' as first wave in winter
- Sir Keir Starmer slams the PM for lockdown delay that has had huge 'human cost'
- But 'redwall' Tory MPs accused Mr Johnson of being 'bounced' into shutdown
- Iain Duncan Smith said the impact on the health of the economy would be 'dire'
- UK recorded another 326 deaths and 21,915 lab-confirmed cases from Covid-19
Boris Johnson has been slammed as 'incompetent' for his disastrous handling of the pandemic as he last night bowed to pressure to put England back into a full lockdown.
In a heavily delayed press conference, the Prime Minister yesterday said he had taken the 'incredibly difficult' decision to reimpose restrictions almost as draconian as those seen in March.
He reasoned that harrowing projections laid out by his scientific advisors Sir Patrick Vallance and Prof Chris Whitty of deaths and hospital cases exceeding first wave levels presented a situation 'no responsible Prime Minister can ignore'.
But the move to a full lockdown from Thursday has been blasted by Labour opponents as 'too late', while Tory MPs threatened to rebel, claiming Mr Johnson was being 'bounced' into the shutdown by scientists.
Speaking on the Andrew Marr Show, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer today warned of a serious impact on people's lives as 'the price of the Government's incompetence'.
'I'm so frustrated at the incompetence of the Government,' he added.
'If what they announced yesterday had been announced when I said it should have been - two or three weeks ago - we could have had the lockdown and schools shut because of the natural break of half-term and people will be waking up this morning and thinking "how on Earth did it get to this?"
Boris Johnson has been slammed as 'incompetent' for his disastrous handling of the pandemic as he last night bowed to pressure to put England back into a full lockdown
'The Government was too slow in the first phase of the pandemic and now it's being too slow again and there's a cost to this. That's why the lockdown will now go on longer.'
He called on Boris Johnson's Government to use England's four-week national lockdown period to fix the issues around NHS Test and Trace, adding if this was not done, "December 2 will be a review date not an end date".
But as was speaking on the BBC, Cabinet minister Michael Gove admitted to Sky News' Sophy Ridge On Sunday that lockdown could be extended beyond December 2 if coronavirus infection rates do not significantly fall.
Sir Keir reiterated that Labour had called for a 'circuit-break' lockdown three weeks ago, but had been ignored by the government at the.
'Now at that stage the Government rejected it out of hand, ridiculed it, now only to do precisely the same thing - but there's a cost to that delay.
As England braces for a second national lockdown:
- Keir Starmer called for an immediate national lockdown as he said delaying until Thursday would cost lives;
- Stunned hospitality chiefs warned that new Covid-19 restrictions would spell doom for dying industry;
- Johnson will bring in the Army to help roll out 'rapid tests' which will see 'whole cities' tested within days;
- Graphs that show how all models of the coronavirus second wave predict the number of deaths will exceed SAGE's 'worst cases scenario' were shown by government advisers at the press conference;
- The UK recorded 326 deaths within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19 and 21,915 lab-confirmed cases;
- The National Education Union called for schools and colleges to be shut as part of the lockdown;
- Health Minister said government could only have predicted need for a second lockdown with 'crystal ball';
- Number of virus patients in hospital has doubled in the past fortnight, with 10,708 patients being treated.
Speaking on the Andrew Marr Show, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer today warned of a serious impact on people's lives as 'the price of the Government's incompetence'
Former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith said the government was 'giving in to the scientific advisers and marching England back into another nationwide lockdown'.The lockdown now will be longer, it'll be harder, we've just missed half-term and there's a very human cost to this.'
The Prime Minister's decision has also enraged backbench Tory MPs who are said to be planning a Commons revolt when the restrictions come to a vote in Parliament.
He added that hundreds of businesses had not yet fully recovered from the effects of the first national lockdown, and forcing them to close up again would be a 'body blow to the British people'.
'The way that the Government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) has pressurised the Government into taking this decision has been unprecedented,' he writes.
'Normally, advisers advise and ministers decide. Yet that system has broken down with Sage believing its advice to be more like commandments written on stone.'
Last night's rushed press conference is believed to have been brought forward from Monday after details of a national lockdown were leaked in advance.
In a WhatsApp message seen by the PA news agency, Mr Johnson wrote to MPs to apologise to them and assure them that Downing Street had not informed journalists of the measures.
But furious anti-lockdown Tories are chomping at the bit over the new shutdown which they believe will leave the already-weak UK economy in tatters and potentially tear the Party apart.
Sir Robert Syms, an ex-Tory whip, suggested that No10 had not properly 'audited progress' made by the three-tier system which sees restrictions with varying degrees of severity placed on individual regions.
One MP told Matt Chorley of Times Radio that the Prime Minister is on 'borrowed time' and 'totally inept', while another reportedly said: 'I think it could be his Suez.'
Former minister Sir Desmond Swayne said he did not support the new lockdown in England because of the 'disastrous' economic consequences.
He told Sky News it would take a 'huge amount of persuasion for me to vote for this disastrous course of action'.
'I'm worried about the disastrous consequences for unemployment, for wrecked businesses, for years of underinvestment while we try and pay this off, when the reality is that the number of deaths for the time of year is normal and expected.
'It is very difficult to believe scientists who tell you that there is a deadly pandemic taking place when there are no excess deaths beyond the normal five-year average.'
The government is expected feel the heat from its 'redwall' MP in the Commons to when the measures come to a vote on Wednesday, ahead of implementation on Guy Fawkes night.
Much of the fury around the announcement has been attributed to the chaotic set to the press conference which was delayed a total of four times.
It originally scheduled for 4pm following a cabinet meeting, forcing bosses to axe Little Mix's talent show.
But viewers were left searching for Mr Johnson when it was abruptly moved back to 5pm, with a half-hour news special was put in at 4.30pm, hosted by Reeta Chakrabarti.
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