‘It’s beginning to look a lot like lockdown’ is the Daily Mail’s front page headline.The paper claims that government advisers are drawing up plans for a new ‘Tier 4’ for after Christmas, that would be effectively amount to another shutdown.
The Guardian’s front page focuses on teachers’ unions’ rejection of the government’s plans for mass testing of secondary school students after Christmas.Unions have told their members not to work on the plans during the holidays and have branded them inoperable.You can read more here.
The Daily Telegraph reports that the Oxford vaccine is expected to be approved within days of Christmas, kick-starting a drive to inoculate millions of people a week from the start of January.
French customs officers will board Eurostar trains from London to Paris as a stop-gap measure to monitor goods entering the EU after the Brexit transition period expires, according to the Financial Times.
The Daily Mirror leads on warnings that the UK could be put back into lockdown after Christmas amid concerns about a “tsunami” of coronavirus cases caused by mixing over the festive period.You can read more here.
Health Secretary Matt Hancock is considering even stricter measures on areas hardest-hit by COVID-19, according to The Times. This could include the closure of non-essential shops if mass testing fails to effectively monitor the most recent wave.
The “bleakest of midwinters” could be in store for the UK with the latest updates on COVID tiers, the Daily Mail quotes Conservative MP Rob Butler as saying.
The Daily Mirror is leading with a report on the 38 million people facing Tier 3 restrictions ahead of five days of easing for Christmas.Read more on this story here.
The Independent is reporting on comments from women and equalities minister Liz Truss about the “new approach” to the government’s equality policy. She said the plans should move away from “fashionable” issues of race, sexuality and gender, believing the current conversation is dictated by “those who believe people are defined by their protected characteristic”.
