This past year has been incredibly difficult for all of us, and I would like to start by paying tribute to the people of Runnymede and Weybridge for their boundless resolve and community spirit, and remembering those who have lost their lives as a result of the pandemic.
Many of my constituents are hurting. The pandemic and lockdown have hit us hard. Many have lost their jobs and many are desperate to see their loved ones. The road map and the fantastic vaccine roll-out bring those most valuable of commodities, certainty and hope—something to look forward to that life will get better. I want to go faster, but I also agree that the need for irreversibility and certainty weighs heavy. I will therefore support the regulations we are voting on today, but I must reiterate that every day we have the restrictions in place they are causing great harm. The Government should move heaven and earth to lift them as soon as possible.
In the brief time I have in this debate, I want to talk about the broader provisions of the road map. As with all discussions on the coronavirus regulations, they are only half the story. We talk a lot about the new normal and the return to normal life after the pandemic. The road map charts out the plan for the lifting of legal restrictions, but not the return to normality. Covid has changed many aspects of life and I have been calling for a long-term plan for living with the virus. I am pleased that the road map starts to tackle that through the four reviews on: large events, covid certification, international travel and social distancing.
Those four reviews will do all the heavy lifting. They are critical to setting out what our post-pandemic covid world—our endemic covid world—will look like after June. When legal restrictions lift, the impact of the recommendations will still be felt. They will have a far longer lasting impact than what we vote on today. They will form the basis of what the new normal will be on a huge range of issues that impact on daily lives, from
social distancing requirements in pubs and restaurants to the wearing of face masks, self-isolation and contact tracing.
I ask the Minister, in his closing remarks, to clarify that we will get to debate in the House the outputs of those critical reviews—the Government’s endemic covid road map, as it were—and that we will be able not just to vote on any resulting legislation, but to approve any formal guidance and provisions resulting from it.
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