Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 23 March 2021
Test and protect is robust and has been so since it was established. It has played a vital role in trying to break chains of transmission and minimise the spread of the virus. It will undoubtedly have helped to save a large number of people from contracting the virus and it will have saved lives as part of that. I am grateful to everybody who is working across that system. Test and protect is a vital part of our defence and of our response but, as I have said all along, it is not our first line of defence against the virus. The first line of defence is still all of us taking the precautions and mitigations that we are asked to take. Increasingly, the most important line of defence is the vaccination programme.
Test and protect is there; it does, and will do, a good job and we will support it with the resources that it needs to operate at the level that is required. All of us will help test and protect if, for the time being, we continue to abide by all the rules and restrictions and play our part in keeping the virus under control, as everybody has done so well over the past 12 months. Every day over the past 12 months, this has been a collective effort above all else. We all have our part to play, and each one of us must continue to play that part as we steer our way through and out of this—hopefully soon.
Nobody wants to go backwards, but we should look across to Europe now with concern at what is happening there. Vaccination rates are higher across the United Kingdom than in many other European countries. Nevertheless, a third wave looks to be starting and we cannot be complacent about that here. This remains an infectious virus, so we have to be cautious and take all the precautions. If we continue to do that, I remain hopeful that we might be on the final straight back to normality. The worst thing that we could do is entertain any complacency about the situation, and I hope, and expect, that nobody will do so.