Calm plea as staff bear brunt of pandemic fears
BBC boss Tony Hall
PENSIONERS’ free TV licences could be granted a fresh stay of execution amid the pandemic.
Over-75s were due to lose their entitlement to the £157.50a-year lifeline from June 1.
But BBC chiefs and the Government have delayed curbs for two months during the crisis.
Director-general Lord Hall left the door open to a further delay yesterday by promising to “keep everything under review”.
UP to a million Britons may be stranded abroad and it would be an “epic challenge” to get them all home, the Foreign Secretary warned.
Dominic Raab said consular networks are striving to help but added: “If they can stay safely in the countries where they are for a period, that’s a choice they have to think very seriously about.”
COUPLES forced into selfisolation could be given online courses to help them through spending more time together, MPs in the Commons heard yesterday. Tory MP Andrew Selous said churches could forward couples links to “marriage and pre-marriage courses” that went live in January.
COURSES Mr Selous
Mr Raab the shelves. People are working out when the lorries arrive at the stores and are waiting for the products to come out.” Supermarkets and supply chains are struggling to cope with the fallout from the pandemic.
Some stores are cutting back on their product ranges and moving staff from other duties to get stock on shelves as fast as possible. Shoppers queued from dawn yesterday across the nation to be first in line when doors opened. While supermarkets were overrun, people were urged to use smaller shops, which are often better stocked. Online giant Ocado had to temporarily halt taking orders due to high demand. The firm’s Duncan Tatton-Brown said: “We have had hours with 100-times the normal level of transactions.”
In the Commons, Mr Eustice called for calm and rubbished the idea that supplies are low. He told MPs: “We have significant resilience in our food supply chain in that food manufacturers are used to coping with increases in demand. There isn’t a shortage of food.”
But in Slough, Berks, many shelves in a Tesco Extra were emptied in half an hour. It was a similar story at a nearby Sainsbury’s, which reserved the first hour for the elderly – but was swarmed by younger people staff could not stop.
Deborah McIntyre went looking for ingredients to bake a cake for her 50th wedding anniversary but there were no eggs or flour. She got only one item on her list – margarine. The 70-year-old said: “This is just crazy. People are panicking and there’s no need. Why can’t they just buy what they need?”
Kath Blayden, 78, was looking for paracetamol, long-life milk, loo rolls and tinned pineapple. Staring at the empty painkiller shelf, she said: “I have never seen anything like this. People are being greedy and I think this will only get worse. There’s enough to go around