Boris Johnson must trust North’s leaders over local lockdowns – The Yorkshire Post says

Far from suppressing the spread of Covid-19, the Government’s intention, cases continue to soar in 19 out of the 20 areas under social restrictions as leaders in Leeds, Manchester, Liverpool and Newcastle question if local lockdowns are working or not.

The question is trying to find out, as precisely as possible, the reasons for this and whether some measures, like the 10pm pubs curfew, is proving counter-productive because of large groups of people congregating as they leave licensed premises at the same time.

And, as Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer set out at Prime Minister’s Questions, the Government’s early intervention in the North – and benchmarks used to justify social restrictions – is contradicted by the Government’s reluctance to use the same criteria elsewhere, including in Mr Johnson’s own constituency.

What is clear is that Ministers need to be making far greater use of the expertise, and knowledge, of local leaders rather than the Government imposing edicts with little or no warning – and then leaving councils, and metro mayors, to pick up the pieces.

This approach was set out with great clarity by Andy Burnham, the Labour mayor of Greater Manchester, when he ventured that “local restrictions should come with local control of the test and trace system” and that the Government was “in danger of losing the public in the North”. It is advice that the PM should heed.

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Thank you

James Mitchinson