3. Business Statement and Announcement

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:12 pm on 9 February 2021.

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Photo of Jenny Rathbone Jenny Rathbone Labour 4:12, 9 February 2021

Thank you. I wanted to raise a serious incident that took place at the Queensferry Gypsy and Traveller site managed by Flintshire County Council at the end of last month, which involved the mishandling of a COVID outbreak. An incident management team was set up, and somebody somewhere decided that—rather than asking the five families where someone had COVID to self-isolate, a decision was made to force everyone living on that site to become quarantined, regardless of whether or not they had tested negative. And what's more, a security firm was appointed to enforce this decision. I, frankly, know of no other instance where a whole street or a whole block of flats has been quarantined, and certainly not without putting in place arrangements to provide money to compensate people for loss of earnings, or the provision of essential food and medicines. So, I'm quite sure, if the incident management team dealing with the outbreak at the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency had decided all their staff had to be confined to the workplace, there would have been an outrage at this breach of their human rights. I want, therefore, Trefnydd, to ask if we could have a statement from the Deputy Minister, who is responsible for equalities, that there will be no reoccurrence of such a major breach of the Equalities Act 2010 and that local authorities are clear that security firms have no role in promoting good management of relations between tenants and landlords, which in any case is essential to achieve public health compliance with COVID regulations.