Rishi Sunak: (26:22)
Laura, you’re absolutely right, this is very difficult for people who aren’t able to be at work. And that’s why throughout this, I think all of us have had that in our heads and we’ve tried to protect as many people’s jobs and incomes as possible, and that remains at the forefront of our mind as we go through this difficult winter period. With regard to the exact level of support I would make two points, if I may, the first is that at two thirds were very much in line with large other European economies who provide similar wage support schemes. France, for example, is 60% or 70%, depending on the sector. Germany’s scheme starts at 60% and goes up from there. Spain is 70% and drops down to 50%. I could go on, but the broad picture is we’re very much in line with peers, but obviously that might not be comforting to you if you’re the person on the other end of that, and you still need to try and make ends meet.
What I’d say is we’ve invested several billion pounds in improving the generosity of our welfare system this year, primarily through the increase in universal credit and also local housing allowance. And what that means is not only is that system more generous, it’s also responsive to people’s needs. So as people who are the lowest paid that you talked about, see that their earnings are going down, the way universal credit works is that the welfare payments will go up to compensate for a good chunk of that. And if you look at someone say in their, pick an example, someone in that late 20s privately renting, working 35 hours at the minimum wage, let’s just say living in a city like Manchester, for example. What they would see on an after tax and after benefits change in their income would mean that they’re probably just over 90% of their previous income once all those changes had worked through. So our system is designed particularly to help those who are lowest paid to help them get through what we hope is a temporary, but no doubt, difficult period.
Chris Whitty: (28:16)
On the two you asked me, I am very confident that the measures that are currently in place are helping to slow the virus and these measures will help to slow it further. I am not confident and nor is anybody confident that the tier three proposals for the highest rates, if we did the absolute base case and nothing more, would be enough to get on top of it. And that is why there’s a lot of flexibility in the tier three level for local authorities guided by the directors of public health, who are absolutely superb around the country, to actually go up that range so that they can do significantly more than the absolute base. Because the base will not be sufficient, I think that’s very clearly the professional view, but there are quite a lot more additional things that could be done within that with local guidance.
And the central thing about this is, these only work if people buy into them, I don’t just mean the political leaders, although absolutely essential that they do and from much consensus as possible. But also everybody has got to buy into them because that’s how it works, it’s everybody doing their bit within this. And therefore that is important that we have local as well as national agreement, this is what we need to do.
In terms of your fourth question on shielding, Jenny Harries is going to give a much longer, I think, discussion on this tomorrow. But the short version is people who were previously in the shielding group are at greater risk, and we would advise them always to take greater precautions, but we also recognize that there was significant difficulties and often mental distress and loneliness for people who were put into shielding as they certainly perceived it. And I think we’re trying to deal with that in the way that we approached shielding over the next phase, but it is something where we do want people to take extra precautions where they can.
Boris Johnson: (30:15)Thanks very much, Laura. Let’s go to Robert Peston of ITV.
Robert Peston: (30:20)
Prime Minister, are you saying that if it were not for the opposition of some mayors and local government leaders, other areas, especially in the North, would already be in the very high category? And Professor Whitty, the Prime Minister said today there are now more people in hospital than when the country was locked down on March the 23rd. People are scared and confused. We know that lockdown suppressed the virus, how can we be confident that these much lesser measures will do the same job of protecting us?
Boris Johnson: (31:04)
Well, first Robert, it’s absolutely correct to say that we’re working with local authorities across the country, but particularly with those badly affected regions that everybody knows about in the Northwest, in the Northeast, Yorkshire, Humber and so on, trying to work with them to support a collective package of measures. I was very pleased that, Steve Rotheram of the Liverpool city region, came forward with a package, we’re helping him. And the offer is that to all local leaders who are facing problems, big increases in infection rates, we’ll help to support local more local tests and trace more local enforcement and so on. We stand ready to work with local government at all levels. But clearly, as a national government, we have to think about our primary duty, which is to save life and to protect the NHS. And we will also do whatever we think is necessary over the next few days and weeks.
Chris Whitty: (32:23)
My experience as a doctor has been absolutely that people in Britain actually do not tend to get scared, what they want is people to give them very straight news and know the worst and then discuss what we should do and then get on a workout, a plan for how to do it. Now in terms of lockdown, as people put it… I mean, lockdown now means a whole bunch of different things in different areas, and we’re not talking about the kinds of lockdown that where at the end of March and the beginning of April. But it is the case we are going to have to do more, that’s the whole point of what the prime minister has just announced and probably in some areas significantly more. And the balancing act here, and in a sense that’s reflected by the fact the chancellor and I are standing here, is the doing things which do the… The things which pulled down the virus to the point where the [inaudible 00:33:15] goes below one, but with a minimal impact on the economy that you can get away with, with that.
But none of us had any illusions about this, and I would like to be really clear about this because I think we should not have any illusions. The idea we can do this without causing harm is an illusion. And every country in the world is struggling with this, and I’m confident we will get through it, but it is a balancing act between two harms, a harm for society and the economy on the one hand and a harm for health on the other hand. And if we damage the economy, we damage longterm health, and if we damage health, we damage the economy and the confidence in the economy. So getting these right is critical, and we’re all trying to find the balance, the middle way, really narrow path between these two harms on either side, accepting whatever we do is not going to be easy.
Boris Johnson: Thanks very much, Robert. Beth Rigby at Sky News.
Beth Rigby: (34:10)
Thank you, Prime Minister. You just said the latest data is flashing at us like dashboard warnings in a passenger jet, and we must act now. And yet the only parts of the country today put under these much stricter rules is the Liverpool City Region. Why is your rhetoric on this outstripping the reality of the measures you actually introducing? And is it because you’re struggling to take regional leaders with you? And Chris Whitty, some areas like Bradford, where I am now, have been living under restrictions throughout the summer and into the autumn. And analysis from the Labor Party last week showed 19 out of 20 of those areas put into local lockdowns have still not come out of them, what is going on? Were they the wrong restrictions, or are people who are not following the rules?
Boris Johnson: (35:05)
Well, first of all, Beth, I mean, just really to repeat what I said to Robert, we want to take local authorities with us, obviously a local approach can be immensely valuable in enforcement. There’s the local knowledge of the places where the virus may be transmitted, local activity and closing down people who are transparently breaking the rules. Local enforcement, local [inaudible 00:09:37], these can be fantastically powerful and we want to work with local authorities to deliver this. And that’s why we’re offering the deals and the solutions that we are. But just to repeat the point I made just now, if we can’t get agreement, then clearly it is the duty of national government to take the necessary action to protect the public and to protect public health, and we will.
Chris Whitty: (36:05)
And on Bradford specifically, I mean, Bradford actually has shown superb leadership, the local authority has, the director of public health have, the local NHS have in the way that they have tackled this. If they had not done so and consistently, working with the communities of Bradford, we would be in a substantially worse place than they are at the moment. In terms of wrong… What Bradford is trying to do, as every town and city and area of the country is trying to do is to find this balance between keeping the rates down without doing unnecessary harm to society, to the economy and to all the other things that in the long run have major implications.
And I think they’ve done a large number of very imaginative things, I see no evidence that this is because the people at Bradford are flouting the rules. I think, inevitably, very occasionally people will, but the evidence over the country as a whole is the great majority of people intend to follow the rules and do follow the rules because the great majority of people want this to protect their neighbors, to protect their family and to improve the situation over once we get through the winter, which is going to be difficult, and everybody knows that.
Boris Johnson: (37:13)Thanks for very much, Beth. Let’s go to Gordon Rayner of the Daily Telegraph.
Gordon Rayner: (37:19)
Thank you, Prime Minister. You pointed out earlier today that there still isn’t a vaccine for SARS, if there isn’t a COVID vaccine this winter, will your default position be to ask people to adhere to the current restrictions for the coming year or so? And just also Andy Street, the West Midlands mayor has pointed out that his area is in tier two even though it only has a quarter the level of infection that Manchester does, which is in the same tier. Do you acknowledge that there are huge inconsistencies in decisions over which area goes into which tier?
Boris Johnson: (37:59)
Well Gordon, first of all, on the sort of variations in the tiers and people’s feelings of that there are anomalies, that’s inevitably going to happen in a complex campaign against a pandemic like this. I don’t want to put the West Midlands [inaudible 00:38:15] anywhere into the measures that we have to do, but as you’ve heard from Chris and you’ve heard from me, we have to get that virus down, it is necessary. I mean, I’m afraid it is going up in the West Midlands, as indeed it is across the whole country, there’s no area where it isn’t going up anymore, alas. And that’s why we’ve got to take especially dynamic measures in those areas that are particularly badly affected.
And on your sort of your bigger point about what happens if there’s no vaccine, well, that doesn’t mean that there’s not going to be the kind of scientific and technological progress that will start to make a real difference. Already you’re seeing how drugs are changing for the better, the mortality rates in ICU, drugs, the treatments, and…… ICU, drugs. The treatments and understanding of the disease is helping to reduce the number of people who go from hospital admission into ICU. We’re making progress in fighting this disease, and we will continue to make progress. I have high hopes, as I said before, that we will get much, much further on types of mass testing. But for now, for now, and I’ll hand over to Chris to give a longer-term prognosis, but for now this is the best utensil that we have to fight the virus collectively together. Strong local and national measures combined.
Chris Whitty: (39:44)
I mean, I’m just going to reiterate really, even more strongly what the Prime Minister has said. We, collectively, humanity has a phenomenal capacity to tackle infectious diseases. Sometimes by vaccine, sometimes by drugs, sometimes by other measures. But our track record on this collectively has been remarkable, and the UK has been one of the leaders in this, and the UK is one of the leaders in a lot of the science that is going on at the moment. So, this does not depend on a vaccine. Science will support us from many different directions. And I cannot predict, and no one can predict what are the combinations of treatments, vaccines, diagnostics, and other interventions that we will have available to us. But I am extremely confident that when we go into the next winter, we will do so in a remarkably better place than we do today.
Boris Johnson: (40:33)Thanks very much, Chris. Thanks very much, Gordon. Helen Pidd of The Guardian.
Laura: (40:37)
A question for the Prime Minister. The Deputy Chief Medical Officer Jonathan Van-Tam said earlier, “The epidemic this time [crosstalk 00:40:52] in the North of England earlier than it did in first wave, and that almost certainly relates to the fact that disease levels in the North, and certainly in the Northwest, never dropped as far in the summer as they did in the South.” Do you accept that the lockdown was too early for the North of England, and was a decision taken from London to suit London South? My question for Chris Whitty. What evidence is there that hospitality is a key setting for infections?
Boris Johnson: (41:12)
No, Helen, I don’t accept that at all. I think the difference between this bout of the pandemic and the first one is how much more localized it is. We took measures on a national basis then at every stage, and on the basis of the scientific advice. That’s what we did.
Chris Whitty: (41:43)
On the evidence on hospitality. So I think Jonathan Van-Tam, to go back to your first bit of your question, put it extremely well today. What we have is a group of things, all of which contribute to people mixing. And the ones that are the most likely to lead to transmission events are indoors, with households that are not your household, in relatively crowded environments, and certain places without masks, and so on. This is true for hospitality. It’s true for other sectors as well. But it is one of the areas where, around the world, there is a view that this is one of the contributors. Not the only one. One of the contributors to this. That is the reason why the hospitality sector has been involved in restrictions, in some cases very significant restrictions, in multiple countries across Europe and the rest of the world.
Chris Whitty: (42:35)
This is a professional judgment. We will not have randomized control evidence or grade-A evidence of that sort for some time for any intervention. Currently we have basically two poles that we are confident of. A full lockdown works, and letting it go will lead to very substantial numbers. Between those, what we’re trying to do, and every country is trying to do, is find, for any particular society and for our society here, the right balance between the various things. All of which cause harm, all of which we would not want to do, but which can collectively, if you do them all together, pull the numbers down. If you look at what the UK has decided to do, and for good reasons, in terms of protecting education in particular, but other things as well, then you have to look at all the things that remain. So, that is the situation we have with hospitality.
Boris Johnson: (43:27)
And don’t forget, Helen, we’re not an outlier in this in the sense that I think they’ve closed the bars in Paris. And in Berlin, they’ve got the first curfews since 1949. So across Europe and elsewhere, you can see people tackling this in very similar ways. Let’s go lastly to Liam Thorp of the Liverpool Echo.
Liam Thorp: (43:52)
Thank you. Good evening. Initially to the [inaudible 00:04:54], back in the spring, you deemed it appropriate to pay 80% of the wages of those who could no longer work because of the lockdown. Are you now saying that the jobs, the lives, the prospects of the hundreds of thousands of people in the Liverpool City Region, many of whom will now earn less than the minimum wage and be unable to pay their bills. Some of them may even be forced into destitution. Are they valued less now?
And to the Prime Minister, you’ve tried to strike a chord of agreement and cooperation with the leaders of the Liverpool City Region. We’re getting a very different idea locally. The first that anybody here, including the leaders, even heard about your plans to shut pubs, et cetera, was in the pages of the national newspapers. And today, at the very last minute, Matt Hancock called a meeting with the region’s MPs with 10 minutes’ warning, meaning that several of them missed the briefing. Some of them trying to connect on a train. They described it as just a total lack of respect for a region where you potentially won’t win any votes. Is it that, or is it just the chaos of trying to organize a lockdown?
Boris Johnson: (44:58)[inaudible 00:45:00], you want to get this?
Laura, you’re absolutely right, this is very difficult for people who aren’t able to be at work. And that’s why throughout this, I think all of us have had that in our heads and we’ve tried to protect as many people’s jobs and incomes as possible, and that remains at the forefront of our mind as we go through this difficult winter period. With regard to the exact level of support I would make two points, if I may, the first is that at two thirds were very much in line with large other European economies who provide similar wage support schemes. France, for example, is 60% or 70%, depending on the sector. Germany’s scheme starts at 60% and goes up from there. Spain is 70% and drops down to 50%. I could go on, but the broad picture is we’re very much in line with peers, but obviously that might not be comforting to you if you’re the person on the other end of that, and you still need to try and make ends meet.
What I’d say is we’ve invested several billion pounds in improving the generosity of our welfare system this year, primarily through the increase in universal credit and also local housing allowance. And what that means is not only is that system more generous, it’s also responsive to people’s needs. So as people who are the lowest paid that you talked about, see that their earnings are going down, the way universal credit works is that the welfare payments will go up to compensate for a good chunk of that. And if you look at someone say in their, pick an example, someone in that late 20s privately renting, working 35 hours at the minimum wage, let’s just say living in a city like Manchester, for example. What they would see on an after tax and after benefits change in their income would mean that they’re probably just over 90% of their previous income once all those changes had worked through. So our system is designed particularly to help those who are lowest paid to help them get through what we hope is a temporary, but no doubt, difficult period.
Chris Whitty: (28:16)
On the two you asked me, I am very confident that the measures that are currently in place are helping to slow the virus and these measures will help to slow it further. I am not confident and nor is anybody confident that the tier three proposals for the highest rates, if we did the absolute base case and nothing more, would be enough to get on top of it. And that is why there’s a lot of flexibility in the tier three level for local authorities guided by the directors of public health, who are absolutely superb around the country, to actually go up that range so that they can do significantly more than the absolute base. Because the base will not be sufficient, I think that’s very clearly the professional view, but there are quite a lot more additional things that could be done within that with local guidance.
And the central thing about this is, these only work if people buy into them, I don’t just mean the political leaders, although absolutely essential that they do and from much consensus as possible. But also everybody has got to buy into them because that’s how it works, it’s everybody doing their bit within this. And therefore that is important that we have local as well as national agreement, this is what we need to do.
In terms of your fourth question on shielding, Jenny Harries is going to give a much longer, I think, discussion on this tomorrow. But the short version is people who were previously in the shielding group are at greater risk, and we would advise them always to take greater precautions, but we also recognize that there was significant difficulties and often mental distress and loneliness for people who were put into shielding as they certainly perceived it. And I think we’re trying to deal with that in the way that we approached shielding over the next phase, but it is something where we do want people to take extra precautions where they can.
Boris Johnson: (30:15)Thanks very much, Laura. Let’s go to Robert Peston of ITV.
Robert Peston: (30:20)
Prime Minister, are you saying that if it were not for the opposition of some mayors and local government leaders, other areas, especially in the North, would already be in the very high category? And Professor Whitty, the Prime Minister said today there are now more people in hospital than when the country was locked down on March the 23rd. People are scared and confused. We know that lockdown suppressed the virus, how can we be confident that these much lesser measures will do the same job of protecting us?
Boris Johnson: (31:04)
Well, first Robert, it’s absolutely correct to say that we’re working with local authorities across the country, but particularly with those badly affected regions that everybody knows about in the Northwest, in the Northeast, Yorkshire, Humber and so on, trying to work with them to support a collective package of measures. I was very pleased that, Steve Rotheram of the Liverpool city region, came forward with a package, we’re helping him. And the offer is that to all local leaders who are facing problems, big increases in infection rates, we’ll help to support local more local tests and trace more local enforcement and so on. We stand ready to work with local government at all levels. But clearly, as a national government, we have to think about our primary duty, which is to save life and to protect the NHS. And we will also do whatever we think is necessary over the next few days and weeks.
Chris Whitty: (32:23)
My experience as a doctor has been absolutely that people in Britain actually do not tend to get scared, what they want is people to give them very straight news and know the worst and then discuss what we should do and then get on a workout, a plan for how to do it. Now in terms of lockdown, as people put it… I mean, lockdown now means a whole bunch of different things in different areas, and we’re not talking about the kinds of lockdown that where at the end of March and the beginning of April. But it is the case we are going to have to do more, that’s the whole point of what the prime minister has just announced and probably in some areas significantly more. And the balancing act here, and in a sense that’s reflected by the fact the chancellor and I are standing here, is the doing things which do the… The things which pulled down the virus to the point where the [inaudible 00:33:15] goes below one, but with a minimal impact on the economy that you can get away with, with that.
But none of us had any illusions about this, and I would like to be really clear about this because I think we should not have any illusions. The idea we can do this without causing harm is an illusion. And every country in the world is struggling with this, and I’m confident we will get through it, but it is a balancing act between two harms, a harm for society and the economy on the one hand and a harm for health on the other hand. And if we damage the economy, we damage longterm health, and if we damage health, we damage the economy and the confidence in the economy. So getting these right is critical, and we’re all trying to find the balance, the middle way, really narrow path between these two harms on either side, accepting whatever we do is not going to be easy.
Boris Johnson: Thanks very much, Robert. Beth Rigby at Sky News.
Beth Rigby: (34:10)
Thank you, Prime Minister. You just said the latest data is flashing at us like dashboard warnings in a passenger jet, and we must act now. And yet the only parts of the country today put under these much stricter rules is the Liverpool City Region. Why is your rhetoric on this outstripping the reality of the measures you actually introducing? And is it because you’re struggling to take regional leaders with you? And Chris Whitty, some areas like Bradford, where I am now, have been living under restrictions throughout the summer and into the autumn. And analysis from the Labor Party last week showed 19 out of 20 of those areas put into local lockdowns have still not come out of them, what is going on? Were they the wrong restrictions, or are people who are not following the rules?
Boris Johnson: (35:05)
Well, first of all, Beth, I mean, just really to repeat what I said to Robert, we want to take local authorities with us, obviously a local approach can be immensely valuable in enforcement. There’s the local knowledge of the places where the virus may be transmitted, local activity and closing down people who are transparently breaking the rules. Local enforcement, local [inaudible 00:09:37], these can be fantastically powerful and we want to work with local authorities to deliver this. And that’s why we’re offering the deals and the solutions that we are. But just to repeat the point I made just now, if we can’t get agreement, then clearly it is the duty of national government to take the necessary action to protect the public and to protect public health, and we will.
Chris Whitty: (36:05)
And on Bradford specifically, I mean, Bradford actually has shown superb leadership, the local authority has, the director of public health have, the local NHS have in the way that they have tackled this. If they had not done so and consistently, working with the communities of Bradford, we would be in a substantially worse place than they are at the moment. In terms of wrong… What Bradford is trying to do, as every town and city and area of the country is trying to do is to find this balance between keeping the rates down without doing unnecessary harm to society, to the economy and to all the other things that in the long run have major implications.
And I think they’ve done a large number of very imaginative things, I see no evidence that this is because the people at Bradford are flouting the rules. I think, inevitably, very occasionally people will, but the evidence over the country as a whole is the great majority of people intend to follow the rules and do follow the rules because the great majority of people want this to protect their neighbors, to protect their family and to improve the situation over once we get through the winter, which is going to be difficult, and everybody knows that.
Boris Johnson: (37:13)Thanks for very much, Beth. Let’s go to Gordon Rayner of the Daily Telegraph.
Gordon Rayner: (37:19)
Thank you, Prime Minister. You pointed out earlier today that there still isn’t a vaccine for SARS, if there isn’t a COVID vaccine this winter, will your default position be to ask people to adhere to the current restrictions for the coming year or so? And just also Andy Street, the West Midlands mayor has pointed out that his area is in tier two even though it only has a quarter the level of infection that Manchester does, which is in the same tier. Do you acknowledge that there are huge inconsistencies in decisions over which area goes into which tier?
Boris Johnson: (37:59)
Well Gordon, first of all, on the sort of variations in the tiers and people’s feelings of that there are anomalies, that’s inevitably going to happen in a complex campaign against a pandemic like this. I don’t want to put the West Midlands [inaudible 00:38:15] anywhere into the measures that we have to do, but as you’ve heard from Chris and you’ve heard from me, we have to get that virus down, it is necessary. I mean, I’m afraid it is going up in the West Midlands, as indeed it is across the whole country, there’s no area where it isn’t going up anymore, alas. And that’s why we’ve got to take especially dynamic measures in those areas that are particularly badly affected.
And on your sort of your bigger point about what happens if there’s no vaccine, well, that doesn’t mean that there’s not going to be the kind of scientific and technological progress that will start to make a real difference. Already you’re seeing how drugs are changing for the better, the mortality rates in ICU, drugs, the treatments, and…… ICU, drugs. The treatments and understanding of the disease is helping to reduce the number of people who go from hospital admission into ICU. We’re making progress in fighting this disease, and we will continue to make progress. I have high hopes, as I said before, that we will get much, much further on types of mass testing. But for now, for now, and I’ll hand over to Chris to give a longer-term prognosis, but for now this is the best utensil that we have to fight the virus collectively together. Strong local and national measures combined.
Chris Whitty: (39:44)
I mean, I’m just going to reiterate really, even more strongly what the Prime Minister has said. We, collectively, humanity has a phenomenal capacity to tackle infectious diseases. Sometimes by vaccine, sometimes by drugs, sometimes by other measures. But our track record on this collectively has been remarkable, and the UK has been one of the leaders in this, and the UK is one of the leaders in a lot of the science that is going on at the moment. So, this does not depend on a vaccine. Science will support us from many different directions. And I cannot predict, and no one can predict what are the combinations of treatments, vaccines, diagnostics, and other interventions that we will have available to us. But I am extremely confident that when we go into the next winter, we will do so in a remarkably better place than we do today.
Boris Johnson: (40:33)Thanks very much, Chris. Thanks very much, Gordon. Helen Pidd of The Guardian.
Laura: (40:37)
A question for the Prime Minister. The Deputy Chief Medical Officer Jonathan Van-Tam said earlier, “The epidemic this time [crosstalk 00:40:52] in the North of England earlier than it did in first wave, and that almost certainly relates to the fact that disease levels in the North, and certainly in the Northwest, never dropped as far in the summer as they did in the South.” Do you accept that the lockdown was too early for the North of England, and was a decision taken from London to suit London South? My question for Chris Whitty. What evidence is there that hospitality is a key setting for infections?
Boris Johnson: (41:12)
No, Helen, I don’t accept that at all. I think the difference between this bout of the pandemic and the first one is how much more localized it is. We took measures on a national basis then at every stage, and on the basis of the scientific advice. That’s what we did.
Chris Whitty: (41:43)
On the evidence on hospitality. So I think Jonathan Van-Tam, to go back to your first bit of your question, put it extremely well today. What we have is a group of things, all of which contribute to people mixing. And the ones that are the most likely to lead to transmission events are indoors, with households that are not your household, in relatively crowded environments, and certain places without masks, and so on. This is true for hospitality. It’s true for other sectors as well. But it is one of the areas where, around the world, there is a view that this is one of the contributors. Not the only one. One of the contributors to this. That is the reason why the hospitality sector has been involved in restrictions, in some cases very significant restrictions, in multiple countries across Europe and the rest of the world.
Chris Whitty: (42:35)
This is a professional judgment. We will not have randomized control evidence or grade-A evidence of that sort for some time for any intervention. Currently we have basically two poles that we are confident of. A full lockdown works, and letting it go will lead to very substantial numbers. Between those, what we’re trying to do, and every country is trying to do, is find, for any particular society and for our society here, the right balance between the various things. All of which cause harm, all of which we would not want to do, but which can collectively, if you do them all together, pull the numbers down. If you look at what the UK has decided to do, and for good reasons, in terms of protecting education in particular, but other things as well, then you have to look at all the things that remain. So, that is the situation we have with hospitality.
Boris Johnson: (43:27)
And don’t forget, Helen, we’re not an outlier in this in the sense that I think they’ve closed the bars in Paris. And in Berlin, they’ve got the first curfews since 1949. So across Europe and elsewhere, you can see people tackling this in very similar ways. Let’s go lastly to Liam Thorp of the Liverpool Echo.
Liam Thorp: (43:52)
Thank you. Good evening. Initially to the [inaudible 00:04:54], back in the spring, you deemed it appropriate to pay 80% of the wages of those who could no longer work because of the lockdown. Are you now saying that the jobs, the lives, the prospects of the hundreds of thousands of people in the Liverpool City Region, many of whom will now earn less than the minimum wage and be unable to pay their bills. Some of them may even be forced into destitution. Are they valued less now?
And to the Prime Minister, you’ve tried to strike a chord of agreement and cooperation with the leaders of the Liverpool City Region. We’re getting a very different idea locally. The first that anybody here, including the leaders, even heard about your plans to shut pubs, et cetera, was in the pages of the national newspapers. And today, at the very last minute, Matt Hancock called a meeting with the region’s MPs with 10 minutes’ warning, meaning that several of them missed the briefing. Some of them trying to connect on a train. They described it as just a total lack of respect for a region where you potentially won’t win any votes. Is it that, or is it just the chaos of trying to organize a lockdown?
Boris Johnson: (44:58)[inaudible 00:45:00], you want to get this?
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Rishi Sunak: (45:02)
Liam, I think it’s wrong to say that any particular area has been treated any differently to any other. We value all jobs and all people’s livelihoods equally. The schemes that we’ve put in place are national. So wherever you happen to be, wherever you live, whatever job you have, not just regions in England but wherever you are in the United Kingdom, you’ll be treated the same. And this is a national scheme. So if your business happens to be told to close and you work for that business, wherever it is, you will be treated the same. There’s no difference in Liverpool or elsewhere as we go through the winter. That was the first thing to say.
I think secondly, in terms of the level of support, obviously you heard my answer previously about our levels of support being in line with most other major countries. Indeed, for those on the lowest page, you talked about those on the minimum wage. It’s precisely those people who benefit the most from the responsiveness of our universal credit system. The example I gave you would show that actually someone in that situation will end up on over 90% of their post-tax, post-benefits income after this situation. So I think actually, that shows that the system is working.
More broadly, we are in a different phase of this now. What in March we thought might … You remember the original furlough scheme was meant to last for three months, and obviously has ended up going on for eight months. Now, we’re putting in place support that we believe is both sustainable and affordable for the long-term. This scheme, the Job Support Scheme, will start on the 1st of November and it will run all the way through to the spring. We wanted to provide businesses and individuals with that degree of certainty and flexibility to manage through the period. That’s a level of support which I think in absolute terms will protect a lot of people’s incomes and livelihoods, but is also sustainable over the medium term.
Liam, I think it’s wrong to say that any particular area has been treated any differently to any other. We value all jobs and all people’s livelihoods equally. The schemes that we’ve put in place are national. So wherever you happen to be, wherever you live, whatever job you have, not just regions in England but wherever you are in the United Kingdom, you’ll be treated the same. And this is a national scheme. So if your business happens to be told to close and you work for that business, wherever it is, you will be treated the same. There’s no difference in Liverpool or elsewhere as we go through the winter. That was the first thing to say.
I think secondly, in terms of the level of support, obviously you heard my answer previously about our levels of support being in line with most other major countries. Indeed, for those on the lowest page, you talked about those on the minimum wage. It’s precisely those people who benefit the most from the responsiveness of our universal credit system. The example I gave you would show that actually someone in that situation will end up on over 90% of their post-tax, post-benefits income after this situation. So I think actually, that shows that the system is working.
More broadly, we are in a different phase of this now. What in March we thought might … You remember the original furlough scheme was meant to last for three months, and obviously has ended up going on for eight months. Now, we’re putting in place support that we believe is both sustainable and affordable for the long-term. This scheme, the Job Support Scheme, will start on the 1st of November and it will run all the way through to the spring. We wanted to provide businesses and individuals with that degree of certainty and flexibility to manage through the period. That’s a level of support which I think in absolute terms will protect a lot of people’s incomes and livelihoods, but is also sustainable over the medium term.
Boris Johnson: (46:44)
Yeah, thanks. Liam, just on your point about cooperation with Liverpool City Region. Actually, I talked to Steve Rotheram yesterday about what we were doing, and he was at the COBRA meeting today to green-light the proposals. And my team’s been talking to local government across the country for days, and days, and days. And we will continue to do so, because I do think that the package of measures, if we implement them all, as Chris has said, very effectively. If we implement tier three properly, in the way that it needs to be done, I do believe that we can drive the arc down in the way that we need to do. But it will take a combination of local and national government working together to get this done. Of course, it will also take all of us to play our part, and do our bit, and follow the guidance.
Thanks very much, Liam. Thank you all very much, and see you next time.
Yeah, thanks. Liam, just on your point about cooperation with Liverpool City Region. Actually, I talked to Steve Rotheram yesterday about what we were doing, and he was at the COBRA meeting today to green-light the proposals. And my team’s been talking to local government across the country for days, and days, and days. And we will continue to do so, because I do think that the package of measures, if we implement them all, as Chris has said, very effectively. If we implement tier three properly, in the way that it needs to be done, I do believe that we can drive the arc down in the way that we need to do. But it will take a combination of local and national government working together to get this done. Of course, it will also take all of us to play our part, and do our bit, and follow the guidance.
Thanks very much, Liam. Thank you all very much, and see you next time.
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