Minister defends self-isolation rules as England’s ‘freedom day’ dawns

Vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi on Monday defended the government’s coronavirus policy that has seen UK prime minister Boris Johnson join hundreds of thousands of people in self-isolation, as England’s “freedom day” dawned.

Zahawi said there were no current plans to exempt key businesses from the self-isolation rules, despite warnings that staff shortages in areas such as food distribution could cause serious economic disruption.

The minister told Sky News that “at the moment” the exemption — which would allow some people to take daily tests rather than self-isolate after coming into contact with someone who has tested positive for the virus — would only apply to frontline NHS and social care workers.

Downing Street also announced it had dropped plans to “tune” the NHS Covid-19 app to make it less sensitive and therefore “ping” fewer people if they were in contact with someone with coronavirus.

“We appreciate this is a significant disruption for individuals and a number of businesses, companies and schools,” said a spokesman for the prime minister. “But isolation is a really important tool in tackling this ongoing pandemic.”

Zahawi said that from August 16 the rules would change so that people who had received two vaccine doses would no longer have to self-isolate. He said the time lag would allow more people to have jabs.

“It’s important we work together to try to get to August 16 when if you’re double vaccinated you don’t need to self-isolate and that will help business,” he said.

Some Conservative MPs want that date moved forward, but ministers argue that self-isolation remains a powerful tool to stop the third coronavirus wave getting out of control.

The disruption caused by the self-isolation policy was illustrated on Sunday when Johnson and chancellor Rishi Sunak were informed by NHS Test and Trace they had been in close contact with health secretary Sajid Javid, who tested positive for coronavirus over the weekend.

Rather than conform with the 10-day self-isolation rule, Downing Street initially said on Sunday that Johnson and Sunak would join a “pilot scheme” that would allow them to use daily tests to release them from quarantine. But that decision was quickly reversed after a furious backlash.

Jonathan Ashworth, Labour’s shadow health secretary, said the original decision was “an insult” and showed there was “one rule for them and another for the rest of us”.

Johnson, who is self-isolating at his country retreat at Chequers, is facing questions from Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer about how he and Sunak were admitted to the pilot scheme in the first place.

On Monday most remaining legal Covid-19 restrictions in England were lifted, with an end to social distancing and work from home rules. Nightclubs reopened shortly after midnight on Sunday. Pubs, theatres and cinemas will be able to operate normally.

Starmer launched a scathing attack on the prime minister, saying he had allowed a “reckless free-for-all” by lifting most restrictions on Monday and saying the government had got “virtually every big decision wrong”.

“The chaotic, incompetent way Boris Johnson conducts himself is dangerous,” he said. “It makes for bad government and has deadly consequences for the British public.”

He added: “The government urgently needs to change course, drop plans to lift all restrictions and rebuild public faith in the isolation system they have undermined.”

With daily case numbers rising above 50,000 and with ministers expecting they could top 100,000 next month, Covid will remain a big feature in daily life, despite the success of the country’s vaccine programme.

Zahawi will give a statement to parliament on Monday afternoon on the vaccination policy for children. Earlier he confirmed some children aged 12 to 17 would be given the jab if they were in a vulnerable group, or lived with someone who was vulnerable.

The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) is considering evidence on vaccinating all over-12s. Zahawi said the only group of children that would get the jab universally were 17-year-olds who turned 18 in less than three months.

Among the business sectors warning of staff shortages because of “pingdemic alerts” from the NHS Covid-19 app telling people to isolate was Rod Mackenzie, managing director of policy and public affairs at the Road Haulage Association, who said “freedom day is going to be a disaster day”.

He said the supply chain could face “chaos” with the haulage industry already short of 100,000 drivers due to factors including the pandemic and Brexit. “The government needs to wake up to this. I cannot underplay how serious this situation is,” he said.