Markus Andrews

It comes amid a shortfall in vaccines as a result of AstraZeneca and Pfizer both announcing delivery holdups in recent weeks.”UK factories are part of our advanced purchase agreement and that is why they have to deliver,” the EU’s health commissioner, Stella Kyriakides, told a news conference on Wednesday, noting that two of the four factories from which AstraZeneca has committed to providing vaccines to the EU are in Britain.”We reject the logic of first come, first served,” Ms Kyriakides said. “That may work at the neighborhood butchers, but not in contracts and not in our advance purchase agreements. There’s no priority clause in the advanced purchase agreement.”Ms Kyriakides said later on Wednesday the EU and AstraZeneca had failed to make a breakthrough in talks over vaccine deliveries.“We regret the continued lack of clarity on the delivery schedule,” she said in a tweet, adding the EU was requesting a clear plan from AstraZeneca for the rapid delivery of the vaccine doses the bloc has reserved for the first quarter.Boris Johnson has said it would have been a “great pity” if the UK had stayed in the EU’s vaccine programme rather than set up its own plan. “I do think that we’ve been able to do things differently, and better, in some ways,” the prime minister said in parliament.Inside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayInside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayAstraZeneca, which partnered with Oxford University to develop its vaccine, said last week it would cut supplies to the EU in the first quarter to 31 million doses from 80 million due to reduced yields because of production issues at a Belgian factory.The EU has been pushing AstraZeneca for a week to revise these cuts and said it expected the company to deliver the full amount on time, though it is unclear how it can force the company to deliver the agreed amounts.Pascal Soriot, the French chief executive of AstraZeneca, told Italian newspaper La Repubblica on Tuesday that the EU contract was based on a best-effort clause and did not commit the company to a specific timetable for deliveries.”Our contract is not a contractual commitment,” Mr Soriot said. “It’s a best effort. Basically we said we’re going to try our best, but we can’t guarantee we’re going to succeed. In fact, getting there, we are a little bit delayed.”Mr Soriot said vaccines meant for the EU were produced in four plants in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Italy.But EU Commission officials claimed on Wednesday that under the contract, the company had also committed to providing vaccines from its two factories in Britain.They added that the firm had not provided sufficient explanations on why doses could not be shipped from stocks at factories which experienced no production problem, such as those in Britain.It comes as a factory in Wales that produces AstraZeneca’s vaccine was partially evacuated on Wednesday after it received a suspicious package and police sent a bomb disposal unit to deal with the incident.Additional reporting by agencies More

Boris Johnson refuses to say why he thinks UK has highest death toll in EuropeLabour leader Keir Starmer has blasted Boris Johnson for his “slow, slow, slow” response to the pandemic and demanded the PM provides answers as to why the UK has the highest Covid death rate in Europe.Mr Johnson admitted it would not be possible to reopen schools in February – but said he “hoped” pupils would be able to return by 8 March. It comes as Amazon halts sales of wines, beers and spirits in Northern Ireland due to complex new excise rules.The company is reportedly ready to pull more products – including over-the-counter medicines – over changes brought in by the Brexit deal. Meanwhile, discontent is “growing” in loyalist communities in Northern Ireland over protocol arrangements, a senior police officer has warned.Inside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayInside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayShow latest update
1611759308Johnson should be ‘visible’ in Scotland, says No 10No 10 has rejected Nicola Sturgeon’s suggested that Boris Johnson shouldn’t bother heading up to Scotland later this week.
The PM’s official spokesman said: “It remains a fact that it is a fundamental role of the PM to be the physical representative of the UK government.
“And it is right that he is visible and accessible to communities, businesses and the public across all parts of the UK, especially during this pandemic.” More

Britons returning from only 22 “red list” countries will be forced to quarantine in hotels, prompting criticism that the crackdown is too weak.
Boris Johnson confirmed the Australian-style plan – requiring people to pay thousands of pounds to isolate for 10 days – but has rejected calls to introduce it for all arrivals.With travel from those 22 countries – in Southern Africa and South America, plus Portugal – already banned, it means the crackdown will, at least initially, apply only to returning Britons.In the Commons, Mr Johnson said returning Britons would be required to “isolate in government provided accommodation, such as hotels, for 10 days without exception”.
“They will be met at the airport and transported directly into quarantine. The Department of Health and Social Care is working to establish these facilities as quickly as possible,” MPs were told.
Intriguingly, Mr Johnson chose to make the announcement himself, rather than leave it to his Home Secretary, Priti Patel – who had pushed for a much tougher policy.Inside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayInside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayHe said the UK had some of the “toughest measures anywhere in the world”, with an expectation that security guards will deliver meals to rooms in the government-supervised hotels.
But, earlier, Keir Starmer attacked the “continued delay in securing our borders”, saying: “We know some of those variants are coming from abroad. But we don’t know the route.
“Surely the Prime Minister can see that what is required now is that everybody coming into the country from anywhere in the world should be tested and subject to quarantine in a hotel?”
And, in Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon, said: “I am concerned that the proposal does not go far enough and I’ve made that point very strongly in the four-nations discussions that we’ve just had today.
She said the SNP would adopt the same plan initially – but also made clear that Scotland was ready to be much tougher, if it failed to persuade London to do so.“Given the obvious practical issues involved, we are very clear that our preference is to have consistent quarantine rules across the UK,” the First Minister said.
“But, if there is no agreement to go further on a four-nations basis, we will be considering going further ourselves and we will set out any such additional measures next week”.Mr Johnson also announced a further crackdown to ensure Britons are not flouting the ban on non-essential international travel during the current lockdown.
“Under the stay-at-home regulations, it is illegal to leave home to travel abroad for leisure purposes,” he reminded the country.
“And we will enforce this at ports and airports by asking people why they are leaving and instructing them to return home if they do not have a valid reason to travel.” More

Schools in England will remain closed until at least March 8,  Boris Johnson has told MPs. The prime minister dashed the hopes of millions of parents by announcing that schools would not re-open after the February half-term. Instead ministers will try to begin reopening schools in the second week of March, if the current coronavirus vaccination programme remains on track. Mr Johnson also pledged to set out a roadmap to lifting the latest lockdown after parliament returns from its own half-term holiday on 22 February. At that stage ministers will be able to judge the impact of plans to vaccinate the top four most vulnerable groups  by the middle of February. Ministers have previously promised that schools would be given two weeks’ notice to allow them enough time to prepare to reopen.  Mr Johnson told the Commons: “The first sign of normality beginning to return should be pupils going back to their classrooms. I know how parents and teachers need as much certainty as possible including two weeks’ notice of the return of face-to-face teaching.Inside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayInside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekday”So I must inform the House that for the reasons I have outlined it will not be possible to reopen schools immediately after the February half-term. But I know how frustrating that will be for pupils and teachers who want nothing more than to get back to the classroom.
“And for parents and for carers who spent so many months juggling their day jobs, not only with home schooling but meeting the myriad other demands of their children from breakfast until bedtime.”Children eligible for food parcels or vouchers will continue to receive them until they return to school.Mr Johnson also said a “programme of catch-up” would be put in place, and will include “£300 million of new money for schools for tutoring” as well as summer schools.Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has called for all school staff to be vaccinated during the February half-term.  He said his party would look at the details of how the education secretary plans to reopen schools.  Schools have been closed to all pupils except the most vulnerable and the children of key workers for three weeks.
Schools closed on January 5, just a day after Mr Johnson described them as “safe”.  Since then ministers have come under increasing pressure, including from Conservative MPs, to unveil their plans to lift restrictions.  Earlier this week schools minister Nick Gibb said any decision would be based on four things– hospitalisation rates, mortality rates, the “challenge” posed by the new variant as well as the progress of the vaccination programme.  Earlier this week Mr Johnson also appeared to play down the idea primary schools could re-open on a regional basis, where case numbers are low, indicating he preferred a national approach.   More

Boris Johnson has rejected a Labour demand to vaccinate all teachers and school staff during February half-term to allow classrooms to reopen.The demand came as Sir Keir Starmer went on the attack over the government’s record on coronavirus in the House of Commons, calling for all 6.2m key workers to be moved up the priority list for vaccination.But the prime minister blasted the plan, warning that it risked “delaying our route out of lockdown” by diverting vaccines away from some of those most likely to need hospital treatment or die.At the first prime minister’s questions since the UK passed the grim milestone of 100,000 deaths from Covid-19, the Labour leader demanded an explanation from Mr Johnson for why Britain has the worst fatality rate in Europe. He accused the prime minister of being “slow into the first lockdown last March, slow getting protective equipment to the frontline, slow to protect our care homes, slow on testing and tracing, slow into the second lockdown in the autumn, slow to change the Christmas mixing rules, slow again into this third lockdown”.As Mr Johnson confirmed that home secretary Priti Patel will later today announce mandatory quarantine in airport hotels for arrivals from high-risk countries only, Sir Keir repeated Labour’s demand for the rule to be applied to all those coming from overseas.And he called on Mr Johnson to speed the return of schools in England by making plans to vaccinate every teacher and school staff member during the week-long half-term holiday beginning on 15 February.Inside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayInside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayBut Mr Johnson said only that teachers would receive jabs if they fall into the nine priority groups identified by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, which covers over-50s, health and care workers and those with underlying health conditions.In a later debate, the prime minister told MPs: “The JCVI list is designed by experts, by clinicians, to priorities those groups who are most likely to die or to suffer from coronavirus.“By trying to change that and saying he wants now to bring in other groups – to be decided by politicians rather than the JCVI – he has to explain which vaccines he would take from which vulnerable groups.”Responding to Sir Keir’s demand for an explanation for the UK’s death rate from Covid, the prime minister replied: “When you have a new virus – and indeed when you have a new variant of that virus of the kind that we have in this country – when you have dilemmas as hard and as heavy as this government has had to face over the last year… there are no easy answers.”
Boris Johnson refuses to say why he thinks UK has highest death toll in EuropeMr Johnson said that “perpetual lockdown is no answer” to the pandemic.And he said that he hopes to set out an exit plan from the pandemic within the next few weeks.The PM said that some 6.9m people had now received vaccinations and the government was “on target” to deliver first doses of vaccine to the 15m people in the most vulnerable groups by 15 February as planned.Labour said that all key workers in critical professions should be added to the next phase of the vaccination programme, covering people aged 50-70 and those with certain health conditions, which is due to get under way after the first for priority groups are completed in mid-February.Shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said those to be offered early jabs should include police officers, teachers, fire fighters and transport workers.“The NHS rightly deserve congratulations for their impressive and speedy roll out of vaccinations,” said Mr Ashworth. “But now we need to go further and faster. Not only will vaccination acceleration save lives, it will help us to carefully and responsibly reopen our economy and crucially ensure children are back in school as transmission reduces.“Ministers must bring forward plans to vaccinate key workers as soon as possible.“Police officers, teachers, fire fighters and transport workers are just some of the key workers who have kept society functioning through this pandemic and are more exposed to the virus. We cannot afford to slow our vaccination efforts now.” The general secretary of teaching union NASUWT, Dr Patrick Roach, said: “We want to see all teachers and education staff made a priority for vaccination.” More

The UK is offering EU citizens financial incentives to leave the UK and return to their country of origin, a move that activists say “undermines” the government’s claim it is encouraging EU citizens to apply for settled status.EU citizens were quietly added to the government’s voluntary returns scheme from 1 January. The scheme, which is meant to help migrants in specific situations leave the UK voluntarily, includes flights and up to £2,000 in resettlement money.The Public Interest Law Centre, which is running a project to help protect homeless EU citizens in the UK, criticised the offer of money to return to the continent as contradictory.Benjamin Morgan, who runs the project, told The Guardian: “It is clear from our casework that some of the most vulnerable EU citizens are yet to resolve their status. Barriers to application and delays in Home Office decision-making remain significant factors.“This mixed messaging around settled status on the one hand and voluntary returns on the other, seriously undermines the government’s claim that the rights of vulnerable Europeans will be protected after Brexit.”A spokesperson for the Home Office said: “Some people may choose not to obtain status under EUSS and may not wish to remain in the UK after the deadline. “That is why we have written to stakeholders to inform them that EEA nationals who wish to leave the UK may now be eligible for support to help them do so under the voluntary returns scheme.”The deadline for European citizens living in the UK who wish to remain here to apply for the EU settlement scheme (EUSS) is 30 June.It comes amid calls from the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JWCI) for the government to immediately lift the deadline for the EUSS, as it warned that thousands of European key workers risked losing their legal status and face removal from the UK.In a report titled When the Clapping Stops: EU Care Workers After Brexit, the JWCI said that one in seven European care workers in the UK were unsure what the settlement scheme was and one in three had not heard about it before they got in touch with the JWCI.One in three also did not know there was a deadline for applying for the scheme or when that deadline was. Some 295 care workers were surveyed by the charity for the report.“If even a tiny fraction of the estimated EEA+ (EU, EEA and Swiss) residents are unable to apply in time, tens of thousands will lose their status overnight,” warned the report.“Without urgent action, the care sector is likely to be devastated.” More

Priti Patel’s post-Brexit points-based immigration system risks creating an “alarming” shortfall in social care workers in the coming years, NHS leaders have warned.The NHS Confederation, which represents health organisations in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, appealed for ministers to show “flexibility and pragmatism” on the new system to avoid blocking the flow of care workers from abroad needed to keep the system staffed.The Confederation’s senior European policy manager Kate Ling told a parliamentary inquiry that there were 112,000 vacancies to be filled at any given time in the care system and “really severe concern” that the new immigration rules will make matters worse, with a knock-on impact on the NHS as it becomes more difficult to discharge patients to care homes.Care workers from Europe and elsewhere in the world are “very unlikely” to qualify for visas under the system in force since the transition to Brexit ended freedom of movement for EU nationals on 1 January, which awards points based on salary and qualifications, Ms Ling told a House of Lords EU committee.“The health and social care sector in the UK suffers from an enormous shortage and unless there’s very significant additional  recruitment and retention. the situation is pretty alarming,” said Ms Ling.The government’s target of recruiting an additional 50,000 NHS nurses in England over the next five years will rely heavily on inward migration, but nearly all healthcare workers will qualify for a visa on the basis of their profession, benefitting from fast-track entry, reduced fees and exemption from the immigration health surcharge, she told the committee.But she said that it was “a really different story” for social care workers.Inside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayInside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekday“Frontline care workers do not qualify under the new points-based immigration system, they don’t qualify for visas to enter the UK because they don’t earn enough and they don’t have high enough qualifications,” said Ms Ling. “There is really severe concern over the impact of the new system and the knock-on pressures on the NHS. “There’s no difference for people whether they’re coming from the EEA (European Economic Area) or wider afield. Either way, they would be very unlikely to qualify for visas under the new system. So the only way to make up that shortfall is from the domestic workforce.”Ms Ling issued a plea to ministers: “The government has said that they will review the impact of ending freedom of movement on the social care sector. “I would urge them not only to review the situation but to have the boldness and the wisdom – or perhaps we should say the flexibility and the pragmatism – to come forward with solutions.“That could involve flexibility and discretion and making changes, possibly, to the immigration system.” More

Boris Johnson has stood by his claim that outgoing US president Donald Trump deserved to win a Nobel Peace Prize.The prime minister was questioned about his comments from 2018 at meeting of parliament’s liaison committee on Wednesday.It comes as politicians who sided with Mr Trump face questions after he tried to overturn the result of the US election and his supporters stormed the US capitol.Asked about his praise for Mr Trump and suggestion that he should be rewarded for his work in office, Mr Johnson said: “I am in favour of the prime minister of the UK having the best possible relationship with the president of the United States and I had an excellent conversation very recently with president-elect Joe Biden.”In 2018 while he was foreign secretary Mr Johnson gave an interview in which he praised Mr Trump’s work on the issues of North Korea and the Iran nuclear deal. “If Trump can fix North Korea and the Iran nuclear deal then I don’t see why he’s any less of a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize than Barack Obama,” he told Sky News.Mr Johnson went on to say: “I don’t see why he’s any less of a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize than Barack Obama who got it before he even did anything.”Inside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayInside Politics newsletterThe latest news on Brexit, politics and beyond direct to your inbox every weekdayThe prime minister and Mr Trump regularly exchange compliments during the pair’s overlapping tenure, with Mr Trump said Mr Johnson was “doing very well”.That comment came hours after the UK Supreme Court ruled that Mr Johnson’s then suspension of parliament had been unlawful.But last week Mr Johnson condemned the “disgraceful scenes” at the US capitol. The next day the prime minister went on to say it was “completely wrong” to cast doubt on the US election and encourage supporters to storm the seat of government.This article was amended on January 27, 2021, to include more details about Mr Johnson’s original comment in 2018. More