UK Covid news: India added to travel red list with rules coming into force at 4am on Friday, Matt Hancock says

[Jeremy Clarksville]

Hancock says India has been added to the travel red list.

The rules will come into force at 4am on Friday. They mean arrivals from India will be subject to hotel quarantine.

He says 103 cases of the Indian variant have now been found in the UK. At the end of last week the figure was 77.


Hancock says the government is “ramping up” its plans to give people booster shots later this year to help protect them from new variants.

He says the government has already obtained enough vaccine doses to begin booster shots this year.


Hancock starts by saying the virus is “diminished but not defeated”.

Covid deaths in the UK are down 97%, he says.

But he says the government must be cautious as it moves forward, because it wants the lifting of restrictions to be a one-way street.

He says uptake amongst the over-50s is 94%. And demand among people in their late 40s was so high that the website crashed when it opened for bookings, he says.

He confirms that 10 million people have now had a second dose.

And he confirms that the government is considering making vaccination compulsory for care home staff.


Matt Hancock, the health secretary, is about to make a statement to MPs about coronavirus.

We are expecting it to be more of an update than a big announcement.


On Twitter Andrew Bell reminds me that there is nothing new about a poll saying more than half of Britons expect the UK to break up within 10 years. (See 2.50pm.) The Guardian was reporting a poll saying that in 1999.

Andrew Bell (@__ambell)

April 1999... but here we are. https://t.co/jU5s2hmSkl

April 19, 2021

Labour has tabled an amendment to the finance bill this afternoon to call on the government to publish an equality impact assessment of the budget. The party said analysis shows that Rishi Sunak’s social security cuts and NHS staff pay deal will unequally impact black, Asian and ethnic minority people because they make up a greater proportion of NHS staff and are more likely to be on certain benefits, such as universal credit.

Marsha de Cordova, the shadow minister for women and equalities, said:

Black, Asian and ethnic minority people’s finances have been unequally impacted by the governments ideological choices. The Conservatives want to hike up council tax, cut the pay of our key workers who have been on the frontline of the pandemic for the last year, and cut vital universal credit support. They’re failing to do equality impact assessments and it shows.

They tell us they are interested in fairness and inequalities, but the truth is they have no interest in addressing this at all.

More than 10 million people in the UK have now received their second dose of a coronavirus vaccine, Matt Hancock, the health secretary, has announced.

Matt Hancock (@MattHancock)

Over 10 million second vaccine doses have been administered across the UK

This milestone shows how far we've come in our fight against this virus & I want to pay tribute to the whole team involved. pic.twitter.com/mRjjPM6TuW

April 19, 2021

The landlord of a pub in Bath has ordered Sir Keir Starmer to leave, PA Media reports. This video shows the angry landlord being held back by an assistant seeking to protect Starmer.

PA Media (@PA)

The landlord of The Raven pub in Bath has kicked out Sir Keir Starmer during the Labour leader's walkabout in the city pic.twitter.com/7byQt2bFqW

April 19, 2021

According to this report by the Telegraph’s Harry Yorke, the landlord, Rod Humphris, is a former Labour supporter angry about Starmer’s support for the lockdown.

Labour has posted these comments on Twitter.

Labour Press (@labourpress)

A clip circulating online shows Keir Starmer being confronted by someone spreading dangerous misinformation about the Covid-19 pandemic. We will not be amplifying it. 1/2

April 19, 2021

Labour Press (@labourpress)

Keir argued that our NHS staff have been working tirelessly to protect public health and that restrictions - while painful - have been absolutely necessary to save lives. 2/2

April 19, 2021

More than half of Britons (53%) do not think the UK will exist in its current form in 10 years’ time, new polling (pdf) from Ipsos Mori suggests. And only a quarter of Britons (24%) say it will survive that long in its current form.

Polling on future of UK Photograph: Ipsos MORI

In this context “Britons” means people living in the UK. Polling companies often just poll people living in Great Britain because party politics is so different in Northern Ireland. As this chart shows, in all four nations of the UK there are more people who think the union will break up within a decade than there are who don’t, but union confidence is highest in Wales.

Polling on future of union Photograph: Ipsos MORI

The polling also suggests:

• While 41% of English people say they would be sad to see Scotland vote for independence, they are outnumbered by the people in England both happy and sad (11%) or indifferent (38%). Another 7% say they would be happy to see Scotland vote for independence.

Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, visiting a baby bank which supports parents and carers living in hardship during a campaign visit to Glasgow today. Photograph: Ewan Bootman/NurPhoto/REX/Shutterstock

The Welsh government has been refused permission for a high court legal challenge against the UK Government over the Internal Market Act, PA Media reports. PA says:

Counsel general for Wales Jeremy Miles tried to bring a full high court challenge over the Act, which he argued “severely curtails” the powers of the Senedd and could prevent it from making laws on food or environmental standards.

Announcing the legal action in January, Miles said the Act was an “attack” on the powers of the Senedd, and also included “wide Henry VIII powers” which UK ministers could use to “cut down the devolution settlement”.

At a hearing in London last week, Miles asked the high court to allow the case to proceed to a full hearing later this year.

But the UK government argued that the claim was “hypothetical”, and that “nothing in the Internal Market Act alters the devolved competence of the Senedd”.

In a ruling on Monday, the high court refused permission for the case to go ahead, saying: “This claim for judicial review is premature.”

As PA reports, explaining the decision, Lord Justice Lewis, sitting with Mrs Justice Steyn, said:

A claim concerning the meaning or effect of provisions of Senedd legislation, or whether the legislation is properly within the Senedd’s legislative competence, is better addressed in the context of specific legislative proposals.

It is inappropriate to seek to address such issues in the absence of specific circumstances giving rise to the arguments raised by the claimant and a specific legislative context in which to test and assess those arguments.

Similarly, it is inappropriate to seek to give general, abstract rulings on the circumstances in which the power to make regulations amending the (Internal Market) Act may be exercised.

As the claim for judicial review is premature, it is unnecessary, and would be unwise, to express views on the arguability or otherwise of the arguments raised by the claimant.

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