We need clarity, consistency and courage of local lockdowns - Simon Clarke

THIS is clearly a very important moment in our national debate about our strategy on coronavirus. It is a time for clarity, consistency and courage.

I welcome the measures that the Prime Minister announced last week. Covid-19 is an awful disease and it is essential that the public respect the rules that are in place for their protection, ​from the rule of six to the guidance on hands, face, space, which will undoubtedly save lives.

I supported those measures precisely because they are limited and proportionate. Fundamentally, we owe it to the British people to be totally honest with them about the situation.

Until we have a vaccine, we are going to be living alongside the threat of the virus and some of those we love may die. We do not know when a vaccine will become available or precisely how effective it will be. Faced with that reality, we need to be clear sighted about the choices that are open to us. It is therefore right that, as the Government have chosen, we should seek to keep as much of our economy and society open as we possibly can.

If we could say with confidence that by holding on for just a few weeks or indeed a few months, we would reach a certain cure, the calculus might look very different. Given that we cannot do that, to return to a national lockdown would be not only untenable but wrong.

The toll such a lockdown would exact would be stark and serious. It would manifest itself in grim statistics and it would fall to us to reflect on them in the years ahead: the cancers undiagnosed, the jobs and businesses lost, the soaring demand on our mental health services.

It would also creep in like sea mist in less tangible ways: the opportunities forgone by a generation of young people, the loneliness of millions parted from their loved ones again.

It is, therefore, my firm belief that now is a time for resolution, when we must do our utmost to live without fear, even in the most dangerous times, as generations of Britons have done before us.

That is not a counsel of despair. Thanks to the hard work of so many people, we are incomparably better placed than we were in March to live alongside the virus.

From the Nightingale Hospitals to new treatments such as dexamethasone, to new capabilities such as the outstanding NHS covid app, we grow stronger almost every week in our ability to defeat the virus. That is reflected in the improved mortality figures this time round. I visited my local major hospital this summer to hear first-hand from them about how they have responded to the situation. I pay great tribute to all those at the James Cook University Hospital for everything they have done.

Although I respect everything that the Government are doing, I want to raise several points about the issues thrown up by local lockdowns.

As the number of local lockdowns across the north of our country continues to multiply, are we in effect seeing a national, or at least semi-national lockdown imposed by default?

Some 16 million people are now living under the shadow of those restrictions. What is our exit strategy from this situation? As we look at the likes of Leicester, Greater Manchester or West ​Yorkshire, we see that none of them are leaving the restrictions. How long can we realistically expect people to comply with those measures? As lockdown fatigue worsens, we must address the growing risk that tighter restrictions will punish the law-abiding while others are unable or unwilling to comply.

The lack of consistency makes compliance harder and I urge the Health Secretary and Government front benchers to reflect on possible options to try to establish the clearest possible protocol so that we can get uniformity of decision making.

I clearly recognise that we are trying to make the most effective intervention in each area, reflecting the local circumstances. However, I worry that a slightly different situation in the North East, compared with West Yorkshire and compared with Greater Manchester, risks making it harder for those who want to do their best to get behind the Government’s measures to do the right thing. Better observance must be our collective goal.

At a moment when there are no easy choices, let us ensure that we enable our country to live rather than simply exist in the period that lies ahead so that the country we return to on the other side of this dreadful situation is happy, healthy, successful and free.

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Thank you,

James Mitchinson