Coronavirus: Twenty million in England added to tier 4 restrictions

On the day Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine has been approved for use in the UK, with the first doses due to be given on Monday. We witness over tweety million people fall under the stringent tier 4 lockdown rules.

The Midlands, North East, parts of the North West and parts of the South West are among those escalated to tier four.

And secondary schools across most of England are to remain closed for an extra two weeks for most pupils.

Education Secretary Gavin Williamson told the Commons that exam-year pupils would return a week earlier than their schoolmates in the week of 11 January.

In the meantime, schools will have more time to set up mass testing plans.

In a few areas with the highest infection rates, primaries would remain closed temporarily, he added.

The areas where primary schools would remain closed are: most of London, much of Essex and Kent, Hastings and Rother in East Sussex, Milton Keynes and parts of Hertfordshire.

Mr Williamson said the temporary school shutdowns would cut chains of transmission. Primary closures would be reviewed every two weeks.

But teaching unions said the move did not go far enough, and one labelled it another “last-minute mess”. They have been calling for a working test-and-trace system since before schools returned from the lockdown in September.

Under tier four rules, non-essential shops, beauty salons and hairdressers must close, and people are limited to meeting in a public outdoor place with their household, or one other person.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock told MPs that rising cases across England mean it is “therefore necessary to apply tier three measures more broadly too, including in Liverpool and North Yorkshire”.

In tier three areas, household mixing is banned indoors and in private gardens, while the rule of six applies in public spaces. Shops, gyms and personal care services can remain open, but hospitality settings must close except for takeaway.

All of the tier changes will come into effect at 00:01 GMT on Thursday 31 December.

The areas joining tier four from Thursday are:

• Leicester City
• Leicestershire (Oadby and Wigston, Harborough, Hinckley and Bosworth, Blaby, Charnwood, North West Leicestershire, Melton)
• Lincolnshire (City of Lincoln, Boston, South Kesteven, West Lindsey, North Kesteven, South Holland, East Lindsey)
• Northamptonshire (Corby, Daventry, East Northamptonshire, Kettering, Northampton, South Northamptonshire, Wellingborough)
• Derby and Derbyshire (Derby, Amber Valley, South Derbyshire, Bolsover, North East Derbyshire, Chesterfield, Erewash, Derbyshire Dales, High Peak)
• Nottingham and Nottinghamshire (Gedling, Ashfield, Mansfield, Rushcliffe, Bassetlaw, Newark and Sherwood, Nottinghamshire, Broxtowe)
• Birmingham and Black Country (Dudley, Birmingham, Sandwell, Walsall, Wolverhampton)
• Coventry
• Solihull
• Warwickshire (Rugby, Nuneaton and Bedworth, Warwick, North Warwickshire, Stratford-upon-Avon)
• Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent (East Staffordshire, Stafford, South Staffordshire, Cannock Chase, Lichfield, Staffordshire Moorlands, Newcastle under Lyme, Tamworth, Stoke-on-Trent)
• Lancashire (Burnley, Pendle, Blackburn with Darwen, Ribble Valley, Blackpool, Preston, Hyndburn, Chorley, Fylde, Lancaster, Rossendale, South Ribble, West Lancashire, Wyre)
• Cheshire and Warrington (Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, Warrington)
• Cumbria (Eden, Carlisle, South Lakeland, Barrow-in-Furness, Copeland, Allerdale)
• Greater Manchester (Bolton, Bury, Manchester, Oldham, Rochdale, Salford, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, Wigan)
• Tees Valley (Darlington, Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland, Stockton-on-Tees )
• North East (County Durham, Gateshead, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, North Tyneside, Northumberland, South Tyneside, Sunderland)
• Gloucestershire (Gloucester, Forest of Dean, Cotswolds, Tewkesbury, Stroud, Cheltenham)
• Somerset Council (Mendip, Sedgemoor, Somerset West and Taunton, South Somerset)
• Swindon
• Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
• Isle of Wight
• New Forest

The areas joining tier three are:

• Rutland
• Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin
• Worcestershire (Bromsgrove, Malvern Hills, Redditch, Worcester, Wychavon, Wyre Forest)
• Herefordshire
• Liverpool City Region (Halton, Knowsley, Liverpool, Sefton, Wirral, St Helens)
• York & North Yorkshire (Scarborough, Hambleton, Richmondshire, Selby, Craven, Ryedale, Harrogate, City of York)
• Bath and North East Somerset
• Devon, Plymouth, Torbay (East Devon, Exeter, Mid Devon, North Devon, South Hams, Teignbridge, Torridge, West Devon, Plymouth, Torbay)
• Cornwall
• Dorset
• Wiltshire