In the House of Commons yesterday, chair of the Home Affairs select committee, Yvette Cooper asked Matt Hancock the following questions…
- “Can the Secretary of State tell me whether it is true, as reported, that even by 7 April, 5% of people arriving from India had Covid, apparently 50 times higher than the rate here?
- “What that figure had risen to by 19 April?
- “How many of the 2,323 already identified new variant cases are people who travelled directly from India?
- “And how many are people who caught it through onward transmission that was not prevented by the border measures?”
The Secretary of State refused to give a direct answer to any and all of these questions, instead he repeated a statement about how brilliant the vaccination programme is, and it is, but ignored the questions from the chair of the Home Affairs select committee.
As the hospitality industry has for all intents and purposes been closed for 15 months, and as full reopening on 21 June now looks less likely. The cause of the delay, which will further damage hospitality has one cause, not putting India on the Red List to bolster the chances of announcing a trade deal with India.
Matt Hancock recently refused to answer questions at a Downing Street press conferences from Laura Kuenssberg. He did the same with Sophie Ridge on Sunday, and now he feels entitled to not answer fellow MPs.
The impact from the decision by Government to prioritise spinning new trade deals ahead of dealing with the pandemic is already being felt by hospitality.
Downing Street has said the government is not yet able to make a definitive decision on whether the easing of restrictions will happen on 21 June.
Downing Street has now also said announcements on the future of social distancing, guidance on weddings and plans for domestic coronavirus “passports” could be delayed by the Indian variant.
Hospitality businesses can only plan to reopen fully armed with information, certainty now needs to be provided on 21 June Step 4 of the government’s roadmap.
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Hospitality & Catering News: Matt Hancock’s discourteous habit of refusing to answer journalists, spreads to MPs, leaving hospitality in the dark. – 18 May 2021 – Matt Hancock’s discourteous habit of refusing to answer journalists, spreads to MPs, leaving hospitality in the dark.
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