North-west being set up like ‘canaries in coalmine’, says Burnham

The north-west of England will not accept being treated “as canaries in the coal mine for an experimental regional lockdown strategy” that even the government’s own medical advisers don’t think will work, the mayor of Greater Manchester has said.

Andy Burnham was backed by exasperated Conservative MPs in opposing Greater Manchester and Lancashire joining the Liverpool city region in the “very high risk” tier 3 category, which means the closure of pubs and bars. Negotiating with the government was like “talking to a brick wall”, complained one.

In a defiant speech on the steps of Manchester Central Library on Thursday afternoon, Burnham claimed the deputy medical officer, Jonathan Van-Tam, had told him the previous evening that “the only certain thing to work is a national lockdown.” But, Burnham said, “the government told us this morning it is unwilling to do that because of damage it will do to the national economy, and yet that is what it wants to impose on the north-west.”

He said the region would not accept being treated “as second-class citizens”, with some of the poorest people in the country asked to accept a two-thirds cut to their wages if their workplaces shut under tier 3 measures. “They are asking us to gamble our residents’ jobs, homes and businesses and a large chunk of our economy on on a strategy that their own experts tell them might not work,” he said.

“Greater Manchester, the Liverpool city region and Lancashire are being set up as canaries in the coal mine for an experimental regional lockdown strategy as an attempt to prevent the expense of what is truly needed,” he claimed.

Earlier Matt Hancock, the health secretary, told the Commons that the government had so far been unable to agree whether Greater Manchester and Lancashire should go into the highest level of lockdown restrictions after a morning of stormy discussions.

Making a statement to the Commons after a series of calls between local political leaders and health ministers, Hancock also said that, as well as London, a series of other areas, including Essex, Barrow-in-Furness, York and parts of Derbyshire, would move from the lowest of the three levels to the middle tier, under which indoor household mixing is banned.

The statement received a sometimes hostile response from both Conservative and Labour MPs, with Lucy Powell, the Labour MP for Manchester Central, saying there was “unanimous fury” locally about the government’s actions.

William Wragg, the Conservative MP for Hazel Grove in Stockport, Greater Manchester, was among Hancock’s strongest critics. He was scathing about a meeting local MPs had with a junior minister from Hancock’s department, Helen Whately. “The meeting we had earlier today was entirely pointless. You may as well talk to a wall,” he said.

“When are we going to be properly consulted, learn about measures via the right channels, rather than the media?”

He argued that the closure of hospitality businesses which would accompany a move to tier 3 would be counter-productive. He said: “The closure of hospitality would drive people into private dwellings where they will mix. We do not, thank goodness, live in a police state, for that would be the only way to police it. Can they please listen to common sense and think again?”

A Labour MP on the call said: “Shitshow doesn’t even begin to summarise that meeting … We let the Tory MPs go first and they piled into her saying: what’s the point of this meeting if you are just going to brief to the media that you’ve already made a decision?”

In response to complaints about poor government communications, Hancock announced he was launching a “leak inquiry” into inaccurate reports about which tier Greater Manchester would be placed under.

Hancock told MPs that the Liverpool city region was so far the only English area at this level, saying: “In other areas currently in the second tier, where discussions are ongoing, no further decisions have yet been made, but we need to make rapid progress.”

Lancashire is also holding out against being put into tier 3. The county has some of the highest infection rates in England, with Burnley now the third-worst affected local authority, after Nottingham and Knowsley in Merseyside, with 554.4 cases per 100,000 people.

Matthew Brown, the Labour leader of Preston council, said both Conservatives and Labour leaders in the county agreed that the support package had to be much better if they were going to consent to tier 3, not just for furloughed workers and businesses forced to close but also in terms of resources for local test and trace.

Closing bars and pubs but keeping restaurants open made no sense, said Brown, who thought it was time for a national “circuit breaker” lockdown. “Our latest data found that only three in 300 cases, so 1%, came from pubs. Whereas it’s actually 10% in restaurants and cafes and pubs where they serve food, and they would be allowed to stay open in tier 3.”

An increasing number of Conservative MPs oppose all local lockdowns. The South Dorset MP, Richard Drax, told Hancock they were “destroying the lives and livelihoods of millions of people”, adding: “We need a plan B, and I’d be grateful if my right honourable friend could tell the house what that is.”

Following the announcement that London would move into the medium tier, Hancock said this would happen at a minute past midnight on Saturday. He also said that Essex, as well as Elmbridge, part of Surrey, would do the same.

Additionally moving from the lowest to the middle tier are Barrow-in-Furness, York, north-east Derbyshire, and two other parts of Derbyshire: Erewash and Chesterfield.