Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Greater Manchester is set to run out of beds to treat people left seriously ill by Covid-19, and some of the region’s 12 hospitals are already full, a leaked NHS document has revealed.
It showed that by last Friday the resurgence of the disease had left hospitals in Salford, Stockport and Bolton at maximum capacity, with no spare beds to help with the growing influx. The picture it paints ratchets up the pressure on ministers to reach a deal with local leaders over the region’s planned move to the top level of coronavirus restrictions.
The dispute between the UK government and Greater Manchester continued on Sunday after the Cabinet Office minister, Michael Gove, said its mayor, Andy Burnham, was risking lives by opting for 'press conferences and posturing' rather than agreeing to new coronavirus rules. Burnham has accused Boris Johnson of exaggerating the severity of the Covid-19 situation in Greater Manchester
London will be placed in high-risk, tier 2 coronavirus restrictions from Friday night as infection rates in the capital continue to increase, MPs and the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, have confirmed.
The decision came as Boris Johnson was expected to sign off on the harshest tier 3 coronavirus measures for millions more people in the north of England later on Thursday, with Downing Street putting last minute pressure on local leaders in Greater Manchester to accept the changes.
Deaths from coronavirus will continue to rise for at least three weeks and the NHS risks being overwhelmed unless the strictest curbs are imposed on another 4 million people, leaders in northern England have been told.
A decision on whether to extend tier 3 restrictions – closing pubs and restaurants and banning household mixing – to Greater Manchester and Lancashire is expected on Thursday.
Keir Starmer called on the government to “follow the science” and impose a national “circuit breaker” lockdown of at least two weeks as the death toll from Covid-19 soared to a four-month high.
In a significant escalation, the Labour leader said Boris Johnson had “lost control of the virus” and must take urgent action to impose a near-total shutdown across England over October half-term.
The education commitee has published the written submission it has received from Roger Taylor, chair of Ofqual, about the exam grade debacle. There is a link to it here.
We have received this written statement from @ofqual.
1. New restrictions have come into effect in Glasgow City, West Dunbartonshire & East Renfrewshire. I know residents in these areas - I am one - feel frustrated and are wondering why we have done X and not Y...so I thought it would be helpful to set out some of the rationale...
3. Our data suggests that spread in and between households is driving much of the transmission just now. That doesn’t mean there are no cases in pubs etc - but unlike in Aberdeen, pub clusters don’t appear, at this stage, to be main driver. That analysis has guided decisions...
4. Based on data, clinical advice is that restricting household gatherings indoors - where it is most difficult to keep physical distance - is vital. Closing pubs wouldn’t be an alternative to that - but an additional measure which, for now, they don’t consider proportionate
8. Data has also told us in recent days that we’ve had a number of positive cases amongst people returning from Greece - that’s why we’ve had to add Greece to quarantine list. Given uncertainties of situation, my advice remains to avoid non essential foreign travel for now
9. Finally, I know how difficult all this is. I hate having to take these decisions and you all hate the impact of them. My plea is that we treat yesterday’s developments as a wake up call and take seriously our individual responsibilities to stop #COVID spreading. Thank you!
Failures of the government’s test-and-trace system are risking an exponential growth of coronavirus in hotspots across England, a director of public health has warned.
Dominic Harrison, the director of public health in Blackburn with Darwen, said the national tracing system was only managing to reach half of those who had been in close contact with a coronavirus patient in towns with high infection rates in the north-west.
Mayor urges backing as report sets out predicted gains from walking and cycling scheme
A joined-up cycling and walking network in Greater Manchester could provide a national blueprint for reducing congestion and air pollution and improving health, a report says.
Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, and Chris Boardman, the region’s cycling and walking commissioner, are calling on the government to back plans for an 1,800-mile network of protected routes for pedestrians and cyclists.
Rolling coverage of the day’s political developments as they happen
Boris Johnson is due to speak shortly at the UK-Africa investment summit in London. According to a press release from Downing Street overnight, he will announce that the UK is going to stop using overseas aid to support coal mining or coal power plants overseas. No 10 says:
At the Summit, the prime minister will announce an end to UK support for thermal coal mining or coal power plants overseas, ending direct Official Development Assistance, investment and export credit.
This announcement forms part of the UK’s wider commitment to use its expertise and experience to help Africa transition away from fossil fuels towards renewable, sustainable forms of clean energy. In 2019 the UK went a record 83 days without generating electricity from coal. The UK was also the first major economy to set a legally binding target to reach net zero emissions by 2050 and Glasgow will host the COP UN Climate Change Summit later this year.
During the general election Boris Johnson told a radio presenter that HS2 would cost more than £100bn. The presenter expressed surprise, because the official budget for the project at that point was just £88bn. but Johnson stuck to his guns. He said he thought the final bill would be “north of £1oobn”.
Perhaps Johnson knew more than he was letting on. Today’s Financial Times says a leak of the review of HS2 by Doug Oakervee says it could cost up to £106bn. The FT story is here (paywall) and our own follow-up is here.
I’m worried by the suggestion that there might be a delay in the north, or even that we might get some kind of second-class option, a mix of high-speed and conventional lines that it’s talking about.
And to me that would be the same old story. London to Birmingham, money is no object, and then all the penny pinching is done in the North of England.
This isn’t just about north-south rail. The point about HS2 is it lays the enabling infrastructure for the east-west links that we crucially need and most people here would say that those are even more important.
This is about building a railway for the north, right across the north, for the rest of the century.
Greater Manchester tells firms they are not welcome as discontent spreads
Ministers are facing a fresh confrontation with local councils over their controversial plans to expand fracking, after one of the biggest combined authorities in the country set out plans to ban the practice.
Greater Manchester’s decision to effectively stop companies from extracting underground shale gas in the region was greeted as a critical moment in the fight against fracking, which critics say is dangerous and unproven.