Prime Minister warns Londoners: ignore the advice and we will act
Scientific and medical advisers criticise city’s young for failing to take virus warnings seriously
OFFICIALS were drawing up plans last night to shut down London and compile lists of key workers needed to combat the coronavirus pandemic.
Boris Johnson and the country’s chief medical and scientific advisers gave the capital one last chance to heed the guidance on social distancing or else face the threat of closed pubs, restaurants, cafés and cinemas.
Sources said the shutdown was “being worked on” by No 10 in conjunction with Sadiq Khan, London’s mayor, and could be enforced within days.
Government sources repeatedly suggested that a lockdown would be announced by today but the Prime Minister appeared to steer away from imminent implementation of such drastic measures.
Mr Johnson said last night: “As long as we think people are staying away from places where they might pick up the disease we want to say thank you for your extraordinary efforts. If it isn’t working and we need to bring forward tougher measures, then nothing is ruled out.” He said most people were following Government advice but it was “patchy” and “that is why we may have to consider going further”.
He stressed there was “no prospect of wanting to stop public transport. We are not going to tell people that if they need to go to work they cannot”.
Prof Chris Whitty, England’s Chief Medical Officer, said he was concerned that younger people, the least likely to be affected by Covid-19, had not taken up the requirements to stay at home. He told them directly: “Take this seriously for yourself as well as for all of society and as a way of taking the pressure off the NHS.”
Earlier, Sir Patrick Vallance, the Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser, warned that young people indifferent to the coronavirus risk were spreading the virus to the elderly by continuing to meet in pubs and restaurants.
He said: “Unless everybody looks at social distancing, it doesn’t have any effect. What we absolutely shouldn’t encourage is the idea that young people can somehow ignore it because they’re going to be fine. Mixing in pubs and restaurants is really allowing the disease to spread. It needs to stop, and it needs to stop among young people as well as among older people.”
Behind the scenes, officials are working out how to enforce closures and prevent non-essential workers travelling on the Underground and buses. More than a third of coronavirus cases recorded in the UK are from London as well as half of yesterday’s death toll. Whitehall officials described the capital as a “city of super-spreaders. The loss of London’s nightlife will put thousands of jobs at risk. One in seven of London’s 8million population work in tourism, hospitality and leisure.
The Daily Telegraph understands lists of key workers in industries vital in fighting the spread are being compiled. It is understood the announcement about who will be classed as “key workers” was delayed yesterday because the Government was struggling to draw up a definitive list.
Anyone designated as a key worker will be allowed to move more freely to get to their place of work and will also qualify to have their children in school or nursery. Obvious candidates include healthcare workers and police officers. However, sources said the Government
‘I can’t say this clearly enough: people should not be travelling by any means unless they absolutely must’
had been inundated with requests from sectors lobbying to have their people included on the list, leading to wrangles about who makes the cut.
The Telegraph understands the list will be split by sector and then by job category but will not be too prescriptive, to allow some flexibility. A source in the food industry, said: “Every sector is arguing passionately for its workers to be included and this has led to difficulties in narrowing down the list.”
It is understood decisions regarding whose children will be allowed to go to school will be left to head teachers. It remains unclear how people who are not designated key workers will be restricted from moving around.
Transport officials admitted yesterday that they were powerless to prevent non-essential workers using buses and the Tube. Transport for London said it did not have the staff to enforce any ban nor any way of checking if a commuter was a key worker.
Yesterday, Tube bosses cut timetables and closed 40 stations. Further reductions were due to be introduced next week to deter non-essential workers from going to central London.
Scientists warned that reducing services risked packing available carriages even more tightly, exposing key workers to disease. Dr Bharat Pankhania, a senior clinical lecturer at the Exeter university, said: “It would be better to keep the network fully open but running empty, meaning travellers would be more widely dispersed.” TFL closed the Waterloo & City line and allnight trains at weekends were halted. Trains in central London would run every four minutes from next week but that could be cut as the crisis unfolded.
No 10 insisted that London would not be locked down, like other major cities around the world, and insisted there was “zero prospect” of a ban on travelling in and out of the capital.
The London mayor acknowledged yesterday that the situation in the capital meant further drastic action was necessary to defeat the spread.
He said: “We are clearly still in the early phase of this crisis but the spread of the virus is at a more advanced stage in London. Further measures will need to be introduced at the point at which they will have the biggest effect.”
Mr Khan said that the level of transport was “likely to continue to reduce”, potentially “very significantly”.
Essential workers would still be able to get around the city, he added.
He criticised Londoners who were refusing to follow the official guidance on social distancing and were still making unnecessary journeys.
He said: “I can’t say this clearly enough: people should not be travelling by any means unless they absolutely must. The scientific advice on this is very clear: Londoners should be avoiding social interaction unless absolutely necessary and this includes avoiding using the transport network.
“It’s critical that we see far fewer Londoners using our transport network than is currently the case.”
Yesterday, commuters complained that their trains were as crowded as ever as a result of the new timetable.
One commuter tweeted: “Currently stood at Victoria station with about 100 people stood on the platform. It’s a virus breeding ground.” Another customer complained that TFL had “successfully caused even more crowding on every train I’ve been on today, which just increases infection risk”.
Separately, the Government is in discussions with mobile phone network O2 about utilising cellular data to generate anonymous heat maps to help authorities observe the movements of the public to gauge whether social distancing is being observed. The data will be extrapolated from the amount of devices that have “pinged” cell towers in a certain location.