Coronavirus Restrictions

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:32 pm on 15 December 2020.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 1:32, 15 December 2020

I thank Andrew R.T. Davies for that question, Llywydd. He will know that the four-nation agreement over Christmas was hammered out in detail over four different meetings between the four nations. It was a hard-won agreement; I will not lightly put it aside. I have a meeting later today with the First Minister of Scotland, First and Deputy First Ministers of Northern Ireland, and Michael Gove, as the Minister in charge of the Cabinet Office, and no doubt this issue will be discussed again there. The choice is a grim one, Llywydd, isn't it? I have read in my own e-mail account over the last couple of days heartrending pleas from people not to reverse what we have agreed for Christmas—people who live entirely alone and who have made their arrangements to be with people for the first time in many months, and who say to me that this is the only thing that they have been able to look forward to in recent weeks. And yet we know that if people do not use the modest amount of additional freedom available to them over the Christmas period responsibly, then we will see an impact of that on our already hugely hard-pressed health service.

So, I think the choice is an incredibly difficult one. At the moment, we have a four-nation agreement. I will discuss that later today. We will look at the figures again together. I still think that the arguments for having a rule-based approach to Christmas, modestly increased amounts of freedom for people, but where they know where the rules lie, is preferable to a free-for-all in which we have a situation where people simply aren't willing to go along with what is proposed and therefore make the rules up for themselves. So, as I said, Llywydd, in whichever way the Governments of the United Kingdom resolve this issue, it will be a very, very finely balanced set of judgments between different sorts of harms that are caused, whichever course of action you embark on.