Nottingham East MP Nadia Whittome is calling on the government to offer better support for residents affected by the further local lockdown measures.
Ms Whittome represents the people in Mapperley, which falls under the Nottingham East constituency.
She made the calls during a speech in Parliament which was was part of a debate on Covid-19 and was linked to votes on various Covid-19 Regulations.
Ms Whittome, the youngest MP in Parliament, described the recent surge of Covid-19 cases in Nottingham as “completely avoidable.”
In the speech she criticised the government for “confusion and delay” in responding to the rapidly increasing infection rate in the city, and for failing to speak to MPs and councillors before information about planned lockdown measures was briefed to the press.
She sad: “The saddest thing about this is that it was avoidable.
The government has failed us time and time again during this crisis. It failed to protect elderly and vulnerable people who have died at an alarming rate in care homes and nursing homes. It failed to implement a test and trace system, and it failed to listen to the OECD’s advice that to protect the economy we must avoid a second wave, and told people one minute to go out to pubs, to eat out to help out, and then blamed them for doing so the next.”
She also called for a “serious economic package to protect jobs and businesses,” an increase in Statutory Sick Pay and an extension on the evictions ban which ended last month.
The Prime Minister announced the tiered approach to lockdown on Monday with a statement in Parliament followed by a national statement in the early evening. Nottingham is placed in the restriction bracket ‘Tier 2 – High’.
Earlier in the year, Ms Whittome returned to her previous job as a careworker to support colleagues at a retirement village complex. She has challenged the Government on their lack of PPE and the failings of the track and trace system.
In my opinion the return of students has been completely mis managed, well, there has been no managed return for them. That’s why Nottingham and Nottinghamshire levels are so high.
Students are being blamed continuously but can we also blame the people who are coming up with ridiculous reasons for not wearing coverings and continuing to not isolate if they’ve been in contact with people with Covid! Many many people in society are at fault and unless people stop being so selfish we will never get a grip in this.