Yesterday in the House of Commons, Munira questioned why Matt Hancock is only bringing in firmer measures now at the borders to prevent the spread of Covid-19. Munira and the Liberal Democrats have been calling for stronger measures for 12 months.
Speaking in the House of Commons, Munira said:
“Many of us have been urging the Government for about 12 months now to take stronger action at our borders, so the measures announced today are very welcome, but Ministers have been consistently slow on this issue. With the ONS estimating today that, tragically, covid deaths in the UK have now surpassed 125,000, how many of those deaths does the Secretary of State believe could have been prevented by imposing much stricter public health measures at our borders since last March?”
Matt Hancock responded:
“We have had significant measures at the border throughout. The new, stronger measures are necessary because of the arrival around the world of new variants of concern at the same time as the vaccine roll-out is progressing successfully. We do not want the very successful vaccine roll-out to be undermined, so it is reasonable to take a precautionary approach to international travel now, while we assess the effectiveness of the vaccines. We are clear that they have some effectiveness; the question is to what degree. That is being tested right now.”