UK coronavirus live: new restrictions placed on nearly 2 million people in north-east England | Politics

Dame Cheryl Gillan (Con) asks Hancock if he will prioritise teachers for testing.

Hancock says test kits have already been sent to schools. Tests are available, he says.

In the Commons Labour’s Stella Creasy asked if the private contractors providing testing services would face a financial penalty for tests being unavailable.

Hancock ignored the question, and just said it was the duty of everyone contributing to the test and trace service to make it work as effectively as possible.

In his opening statement Hancock said the new restrictions in the north-east would affect people in Northumberland, North Tyneside, South Tyneside, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Gateshead, Sunderland and County Durham.

From Friday, residents in these areas will be banned from socialising with other people outside their own households or support bubble, while food and drink venues will be restricted to table service only, Hancock said.

Leisure and entertainment venues must close between 10pm and 5am.

Here is the Department for Health’s news release with the list of the 25 hospitals in England that will get a share of the £150m fund being allocated to expand and upgrade A&E facilities.

The release also provides more details of the scheme to get patients booking appointments for A&E through NHS 111. The scheme is being piloted in Cornwall, Portsmouth and south-east Hampshire, Blackpool and Warrington and will be rolled out more generally from December.

Commenting on the plan, Dr Cliff Mann, the NHS national clinical director for urgent and emergency care, said:

While emergency admissions are now back to near normal levels and 999 calls are actually above usual, Covid-19 infection control means rethinking how we safely look after people who might previously have been to an emergency department for a more minor condition. Local teams are working hard to expand and adapt services to ensure people can continue to get the care they need safely, whether that’s in hospital or closer to home.

This additional investment will help us continue the development of NHS 111 and provide a broader range of services, with direct booking that will ensure all patients can see the right clinicians in the right setting, and address the extra challenges posed by Covid-19 so that emergency departments can safely treat those patients who do require their services.

Hancock is responding to Ashworth.

Referring to NHS 111, Hancock says he wants to improve access to the NHS. The booking system will let A&E know when people are coming.

He says there is a plan for care homes to get PPE. Details will be set out shortly in the winter plan for social care.

On testing, Hancock says “of course there’s a challenge in testing”. But capacity is at record levels. The problem is, demand has gone up faster, he says.

He says the government has chosen to prioritise care home residents. Of the tests available, more than 100,000 a day are sent to care homes.

Labour should welcome prioritisation for testing, he says.

On contact tracing, Hancock criticises Ashworth for playing “a decisive card” because he was trying to differentiate between public and private. He says the two sides should work together.

Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, is responding.

He welcomes the extra funding for the NHS.

But he asks if triaging access to A&E will worsen health inequalities. And if it leads to more people going to GP surgeries, will they get more funding?

Does Hancock rule out reimposing nationwide rules on family visits to care homes?

Ashworth points out that Hancock did not cover testing in his statement. Four months ago Hancock said testing for all was established. He promised test and trace. But instead we have ended up with trace a test, he says.

He says in his Commons statement on Tuesday Hancock quoted many figures for the number of tests being carried out in MPs’ constituencies. But those figures were no comfort to people being asked to travel miles for a test.

Who will get priority under the new system?

Will the north-east get extra testing capacity?

When will poor-performing outsourcing firms be stripped of their test and trace contracts?

Ashworth says people made sacrifices during the lockdown. But the government did not honour its side of the bargain. It was meant to deliver a functioning test and trace system, but it failed.

Is the government ruling out a second national lockdown in all circumstances?

Hancock says winter is always a stretching time. But this winter presents particular challenges, he says.

He says a further £2.7bn has been allocated to the NHS to help it manage over the winter. This is in addition to money provided for PPE, he says.

He says the money will help hospitals tackle the backlog in operations.

He says many emergency departments are too small.

In August £300m was announced for emergency upgrades. He says more funding is now being allocated to expand more emergency departments.

The role of NHS 111 will be expanded, he says. Millions of people used it to get the best advice on coronavirus. He says people will not be turned away from emergency departments in serious situations. But the government is investing £24m in NHS 11 call handling capacity and it will build on trials to turn it into a gateway for emergency care. People will be able to use it to make a booking with the appropriate care. That could be a booking with a GP, but it could be a booking for A&E, he says.

He says this approach will be rolled out generally from December.

• Hancock confirms NHS 111 will introduce a booking service for some patients visiting A&E in England.

Hancock says there have been concerning rises in infection rates in some parts of the north-east.

Local authorities wrote to him asking for tighter restrictions, he says.

And he says he is putting those in place.

He summarises the measures that were briefed overnight.

Matt Hancock, the health secretary, is speaking now.

He says he will explain the new local restrictions, and measures being taken to prepare the NHS for winter.

NHS test and trace has published its latest weekly performance statistics (pdf). Here are the main points.

• A total of 18,371 new people tested positive for coronavirus in England in the week to 9 September, the figures show. That’s a 75% increase on the total for the previous week.

• The number of people receiving in-person test results within 24 hours has halved, the figures show. The service has never been able to meet Boris Johnson’s target of delivering test results within 24 hours. But the latest figures show that in the week ending 9 September just 33.3% of people tested a regional site, local site or mobile testing unit – a so-called “in-person” test – received their result within 24 hours. This is down from 66.5% in the previous week.

• The service reached 73.9% of people identified as close contacts of people who had tested positive for coronavirus in the week ending 9 September and told them to self-isolate, the figures show. That was an increase on the figure for the previous week, 69.5%, but well below the average performance since May, 78.1%, and below the unofficial 80% target set by the government’s Scientific Advisory Group of Emergencies for the service to be effective.

More than 1m people have now downloaded the Protect Scotland contact-tracing app, the Scottish government has announced.

One source of information on coronavirus taken seriously by scientists is the data from the Covid symptom app launched by a team from King’s College London. More than 4 million people have downloaded the app, and in an interview on the Today programme this morning Prof Tim Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College, said that his findings suggested that, if people did not have severe headaches or fatigue, they probably did not have coronavirus. He said:

What we are learning from all these data points [is that] nearly everybody, 80% of people, in all the age groups in the first week reported quite severe headaches and tiredness, fatigue.

What we are seeing is, if people are particularly worried about colds and Covid, if they don’t have this combination of symptoms, quite severely, it’s highly unlikely that their symptoms are actually related [to coronavirus].

In a comment that may offer reassurance to thousands, he also said that people with a runny nose, or who were sneezing, almost certainly did not have coronavirus. He said:

We’ve also shown some negative signs in our app. So if you do have a runny nose, or congestion, or sneezing, that’s really a sign you absolutely do not have Covid.