Warning against full lockdown amid fears over parties
BOROUGH’S CHIEF SAYS CURRENT POLICY IS WORKING AND FEARS IMPACT ON ECONOMY AND COMMUNITY TENSIONS
A RETURN to full lockdown restrictions across Oldham would be economically damaging and ‘inflame community tensions’ in the borough, its council leader has warned.
Leaders and residents are waiting with baited breath to find out whether the government intends on introducing a Leicester-style lockdown – which would force non-essential shops, businesses and pubs to close.
It is understood a decision will be made by today on whether stricter measures are required to tackle Oldham’s infection rate, which is the second highest in the country. While positive cases of the virus are being reported in almost all neighbourhoods, most of the cases that are being recorded are across central Oldham, particularly in the areas of Alexandra Park and Werneth.
Council leader Sean Fielding said that a major concern about lockdown measures being brought in was around its impact on ‘social cohesion.’
“There are examples of people in communities who are pointing the finger of blame at other communities, using that to justify their own non-compliance with the restrictions,” he added. “We’ve had house parties in various parts of the borough. We’re taking enforcement against several businesses that aren’t in the central Oldham areas.
“We have got a particularly high incidence of cases in central Oldham areas, and those are areas where there are more people from the south Asian community.
“However also in those communities you have high levels of poverty, high levels of cramped and overcrowded housing, high levels of people that work in public facing occupations that never shut down because they were essential workers. To label it as an ethnicity issue is quite crude and not accurate, there are many more underlying factors.”
He said that he had received a ‘postbag’ of letters about a possible lockdown containing ‘really unpleasant language.’
He said: “I can’t emphasise enough how strongly we’ve made the case that any attempt to impose a local lockdown in the way that it was imposed in Leicester has the potential to inflame community tensions. And we’re already seeing a bit of that even before it’s even happened.”
Coun Fielding added that bringing in lockdown measures that would force businesses that only reopened at the beginning of July to close again, would be devastating for the borough’s economy.
He said: “We’ve already got a really fragile economy. If your pub, your bar, restaurant or non-essential shop shuts in Oldham it’s easier just to take that business elsewhere. And the likelihood is, if that business had to close for a second time it just wouldn’t reopen.”
Coun Fielding, along with Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham and Oldham’s three MPs, is petitioning health secretary Matt Hancock for a further twoweek reprieve.
They hope this will give enough time for local measures to take effect, and to demonstrate people can abide by the restrictions on socialising with other households. He said: “To not give those measures time to bed in would be acting prematurely and we are already starting to see the infection rate fall. Lockdown ‘lite’ is working, we just need more time.
“I think the government would come to regret, probably quite quickly introducing a local lockdown in Oldham because they would find that it would not control the infection rate in the way that they wanted and they would also cause a whole set of other problems both economically and socially in this borough.”
According to figures released by the Greater Manchester Combined Authority, the seven-day rate of positive tests per 100,000 people in Oldham has fallen from 109.7 to 83.1 in the week ending August 15.
Chiefs also do not believe closing down businesses and hospitality venues would have a significant impact on the figures, as the cause of rising cases has been ‘household transmission.’