“The end really is in sight”: PM reveals timetable to exit lockdown

All legal limits on social contact are set to be removed in June, Boris Johnson told MPs today. Setting out his timetable for easing England’s third Covid-19 lockdown, the Prime Minister told MPs that “the end really is in sight… and a wretched year will give way to a very different spring and summer ahead”.

Under the new plans, which the PM hopes will allow the “cautious, but also irreversible” lifting of lockdown, most of society and the economy will reopen by May – including pubs, restaurants, shops, hotels and live sport. Currently the measures only apply to England, but the PM assured the Commons that he is working closely with the devolved nations.

Replacing the tiered regional system, Johnson’s new “roadmap” involves four England-wide steps for unlocking the country, with the first step split into two parts on 8 and 29 March.

Under this first stage, all schools in England will fully reopen on 8 March, with outdoor after-school sports and activities allowed. Recreation in a public outdoor space will be allowed between two people, meaning they would be allowed to sit down for a coffee, drink or picnic – activities not currently permitted under the outside exercise rule.

If the right progress is being made, the second half of step one will come into force on 29 March in time for the start of schools’ Easter holidays. Under the new rules, outdoor gatherings of either six people or two households will be allowed outdoors, including in private gardens, while outdoor sports facilities such as tennis or basketball courts will reopen.

Step two, which could be brought in from 12 April, would see shops, hairdressers, gyms and outdoor hospitality reopening, in addition to outdoor hospitality venues such as zoos and theme parks.

Step three, which would start no earlier than 17 May, would see most social contact rules lifted, as well as limited mixing indoors. Gatherings of up to 30 people will be allowed outdoors and two households, or up to six people, will be allowed to eat or drink inside pubs and restaurants.

Johnson said step four would begin no earlier than 21 June: “With appropriate mitigations, we will aim to remove all legal limits on social contact and on weddings and other life events. We will reopen everything up to and including nightclubs and enable large events such as theatre performances above the limits of step three, potentially using testing to reduce the risk of infection”.

Johnson stressed that the government’s decisions would be led by “data, not dates”, and that the removal of restrictions would be conditional on four tests being met. These include: the continued successful deployment of the vaccine programme and evidence that jabs are reducing hospital admissions and deaths.

Johnson told MPs that the government will also be monitoring data to ensure “that infection rates do not risk a surge in hospitalisations, which would put unsustainable pressure on the NHS” and that the risks posed by Covid-19 are not fundamentally changed by new “variants of Covid that cause concern”.

The PM said that there would be at least five weeks between each step, and told MPs that there was “no credible route to a zero-Covid Britain or indeed a zero-Covid world”, adding: “We cannot persist indefinitely with restrictions that debilitate our economy, our physical and mental wellbeing, and the life chances of our children”.