What will happen in Oxfordshire after lockdown?

Ian Hudspeth, the Conservative leader of Oxfordshire County Council, also called for local involvement in test and trace to be 'ramped up' as councillors met today.

At the meeting, councillors also criticised the hesitation over placing all of Oxfordshire into Tier 2 restrictions before the new lockdown was announced.

Mr Hudspeth said: "When we come out of national lockdown my current understanding is we will move into the tier system again."

Also read: Huge boa constrictor on the loose in Oxford

The Government's month-long lockdown of England is due to last from this Thursday, November 5, until December 2.

The Tory council leader added: "I cannot prejudge what the data will say in December. But I can assure you we in Oxfordshire will follow the scientific data from our director of public health."

Ian Hudspeth

Oxfordshire's council leaders of all three main political parties had previously been united in support to move the entire county into Tier 2 restrictions.

And at the meeting, both Conservatives in the council's majority group and Labour and Lib Dem opposition councillors criticised the way the Government had handled the tier system and the lockdown.

Foremost among them was Mr Hudspeth himself, who said the coronavirus did not 'respect boundaries', alluding to the fact that the Government had only placed Oxford into a Tier 2 lockdown, rather than the whole county.

He said: "The virus does not respect boundaries therefore we have to consider what is best for the majority of Oxfordshire. It doesn’t simply disappear as you move past the park and ride on Botley Road."

Boris Johnson announced the new lockdown on Saturday, October 31

Labour opposition leader Liz Brighouse commended the way the council's Conservative group had supported moving all of Oxfordshire into Tier 2 in comparison with the Government's slower decision making.

She said: "What a great difference it is being here in Oxfordshire with a council leader who has done quite an enormous amount to follow the science."

Lib Dem leader Richard Webber said he hoped England could 'avoid some of the impact on mortality, on physical and mental health' that locking down late in March had caused.

He also accused Oxfordshire's Conservative MPs of 'grandstanding' when they lobbied against the county's director of public health, who applied to the Government to take Oxfordshire into tier 2.

Read again: Oxfordshire MPs and councillors divided over Tier 2 move

But Conservative cabinet member for finance David Bartholomew said: "Those MPs that took a different view, that was not grandstanding, that was a sincere attempt to consider another opinion."

There were also calls for more funding to be given to local public health teams to take over the coronavirus Test and Trace system from private contractors.

Green councillor Pete Sudbury asked Mr Hudspeth if he would support this.

He said: "The Serco version is only world beating in its ineptitude."

Current council involvement in Test and Trace means that local teams fill in the gaps in the system that the national team misses, including texting and calling people from local telephone numbers and even knocking on their doors to tell them they may have been in contact with someone who has had coronavirus.

Cabinet member for adult social care and public health Lawrie Stratford said there had been some problems with people not responding to Test and Trace callers, or not leaving their contact details with businesses who asked for them.

He urged the public: "Please respond. It might be in your own interest."