Public Health

Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 2:08 pm on 4 November 2020.

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Photo of Vaughan Gething Vaughan Gething Labour 2:08, 4 November 2020

I think there are couple of points to make in response. The first is that with the firebreak that we're going through, we should remind ourselves (a) that there was a rising tide of coronavirus that necessitated the need to have a firebreak, to give us space to make sure we don't overwhelm our NHS and have unnecessary harm and death being caused. We chose to prioritise the interests of children and young people because we knew the mental health impact that closing schools for a significant period had upon children and young people in the here and now. We also know it has a significant impact on their future prospects, and that is an uneven impact, with children from our least advantaged backgrounds having the biggest impact from school closures. Once we decided to maintain all primary schools and to have face-to-face learning for years 7 and 8, that meant we had to take a much more strict approach with other closures to make the stay-at-home message and the impact of the firebreak as effective as possible. That's why non-essential retail, why hospitality and gyms were all sectors affected by the closure.

In terms of moving forward, you can see that England are also closing all gyms with their four-week lockdown as well, but for the future, what I can't say is that we'll definitely take one form of action or not. We're looking to have a consistent set of national rules to get us all to the end of the year, and we then need to try to reset and understand the position that we're in. Any future action the Government takes won't be determined on arguments run now, it'll be about the evidence at the time and an understanding of what we all need to do. So, the evidence will continue to guide the approach that Ministers take, the advisors will advise us, and Ministers will ultimately have to decide and be accountable to the public for the choices we are making to keep us all safe and to save lives and livelihoods.