Support lacking in PM’s roadmap says MP
EAST Runcorn MP Mike Amesbury has called for assurances for business and workers as he expressed concerns over the Prime Minister’s lockdown exit plan.
Shadow housing minister Mr Amesbury welcomed Boris Johnson’s “new cautionary tone” but picked out areas he saw as needing improvement.
The Labour MP said he had spoken to businesses and “Ryan from the Queen’s Head [pub]” in Frodsham had been “disappointed” that the PM’s announcement did not feature details for businesses expected to remain shut as restrictions start to ease – particularly in hospitality and leisure.
Mr Amesbury also highlighted the need to support low-paid workers including when required to isolate and he called for school staff to be prioritised for immunisation following the opening of mass vaccination centres, adding that the Chester Racecourse centre could vaccinate more if supply was ramped up.
Further uncertainty remains for businesses and the selfemployed, he said.
Mr Amesbury said: “As [Labour leader] Keir Starmer pointed out – proper support needs to be provided for the three million selfemployed who have been hung out to dry over the last year.
“The PM says we must wait for next week’s budget but companies are running out of cash and desperate to know if the business rates holiday will be extended, whether the VAT cut will be extended as well as furlough.
“Low-paid workers, many working in the care sector need financial support if they are required to self isolate.
“Sick pay and the current rigid self isolation payment system must be fixed while the uplift in Universal Credit maintained.
“A road map informed by evidence, driven by the continued scaling up of the vaccine rollout, cautious but with sufficient support for people and business will see us through.”
The Weaver Vale MP, whose constituency spans much of east Runcorn, Frodsham, Daresbury and Northwich, outlined some general concerns about the timing of the travel ban, saying: “Given that those who have lost their lives to Covid-19 now stands at over 121,000 and we have the deepest economic downturn of any G7 country, PM Johnson’s new cautionary tone to the transition out of lockdown is more welcome.
“But a number of elements concern me.
“An international travel and a partial ban were only put in place on February 15, nearly a year from the start of the pandemic.
“Contrast this with New Zealand,
Taiwan and Australia. The death toll in those countries is very low by comparison.”
Mr Johnson set out his lockdown exit plan to Parliament on Monday, February 22.
In it, he said the “roadmap should be cautious but irreversible”, and that vaccination had made the lifting of restrictions possible.
Key dates in the plan included: schools and university courses that require practical teaching to reopen on March 8; people able to meet a person from a different household for outdoor recreation from March 8; the “rule of six” to return on March 29; a first dose of vaccine to everyone in priority groups nine and above – the over50s and clinical risk groups aged 16-to-75, by April 15; and a first dose to every adult by the end of July.
June 21 is the major date in the PM’s plan, when the Government “aims to remove all legal limits on social contact”.
Mr Johnson told the Commons:
“Mr Speaker, as we proceed through these steps we will benefit from the combined protection of our vaccines and the continued expansion of rapid testing.
“We will extend the provision of free test kits for workplaces until the end of June and families, small businesses and the selfemployed can collect those tests from local testing sites.
“Mr Speaker, in view of these cautious but I hope irreversible changes, people may be concerned about what these changes mean for the various support packages, for livelihoods for people and for the economy.
“So I want to assure the House, we will not pull the rug out.
“For the duration of the pandemic, the government will continue to do whatever it takes to protect jobs and livelihoods across the UK.
“And my Rt Hon Friend the Chancellor will set out further details in the Budget next Wednesday.”