‘No plans’ to end lockdown restrictions earlier than 21 June, No10 says

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Get our free View from Westminster email SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy policy The government has “no plans” to bring forward the earliest date for the end of lockdown from 21 June, despite “hugely encouraging” data on Covid transmission, Downing Street has said. Following calls from Tory MPs for Mr Johnson to consider bringing forward his plans, the prime minister’s official spokesperson told reporters: “We have not plans to deviate from the approach set out in the roadmap.” Figures on cases, hospitalisations and deaths are “in line with expectations, which is hugely encouraging”, said the spokesperson. “So it’s obviously a political judgment as to what is acceptable in terms of number of infections, but we don’t see any prospect of, for instance, the NHS being overwhelmed – with the one caveat around variants I’ve already mentioned – so it’s always a matter of judgment.” He said there would need to be “much higher levels of infection in society in order to risk overwhelming the NHS and we think that’s actually unlikely to happen unless a variant comes along which resets that relationship again.” Sage member Professor Stephen Reicher of the University of St Andrews said the public should take the PM’s suggestion that social distancing could be scrapped in June with a “little bit of a pinch of salt”. He told BBC Breakfast that “things can change very rapidly”, adding: “The real important issue is this – if we take this as a signal that things are all over, if we relax and if we mix now, the paradox is we will push up the infections and will make it less likely that we can relax on 21 June.” And Prof Reicher warned: “Even after restrictions go, it makes sense to have sensible and cautious precautions; not in a way that limit our everyday lives, not in a way that stops us seeing people or hugging people, but just realising, for instance, that on the whole, we are safer outside, don’t sit too close to people, open the windows.”