It is with a heavy heart that I stand today to support the Government’s proposals for a national lockdown, which,
incidentally, are supported by 55% of Bishop Auckland residents, according to a local survey I ran this week. Let me begin by making it perfectly clear that the notions of freedom and liberty remain at the core of my values, my ideology and my very ethos, and it goes entirely against my instincts to impose restrictions on the freedoms of our residents. I certainly did not come into politics to tell people why they could not leave their homes, who they could visit, whether they could spend time with their families or to tell people they are not allowed to go out on a first date. This is not a decision that any of us will take lightly, but I believe we must make the choice to do the next right thing and support this four-week lockdown.
We know that the next four weeks will be difficult. I remember all too well the solitude of living on my own during the first lockdown and what that did to my mental state, and that is a tiny speck of nothing compared to what some of our constituents have gone through. People have lost loved ones, either to covid or to other illnesses that covid left undetected, and my deepest condolences go to everyone affected in that way.
Mental health is an issue very close to my heart, and it continues to decline for so many across our communities. Each of us must do all we can to support them in the difficult, dark nights ahead.
Many businesses are facing unprecedented difficulties, and each has a group of employees who are desperately concerned about their jobs, their livelihoods and their futures. I am incredibly grateful to the Chancellor and the Treasury team for the support they have put in place, and I urge them to continue engaging with MPs, businesses, local authorities and individual residents to ensure that we can continue to support as many people as possible through this period of economic hardship.
I hear people ask how I can justify voting for these restrictions today, and it is because I am thinking about the future of our freedom. Like all of us, I want to see life return to normal as soon as possible. I want to see children playing with their friends, students celebrating freshers’ week, couples having the big wedding of their dreams and families getting together to celebrate Christmas. But getting our freedom back means biting the bullet now, acting decisively and suppressing the virus through this time-restricted lockdown.
We will defeat this virus, of that I am completely confident. We will return to the sunlit uplands of hope, optimism and promise, and we will be able to refocus all our efforts, not on an unexpected global pandemic but on rebuilding our country—as the PM says, building back better—on levelling up the left-behind areas and on massively increasing opportunity for people in Bishop Auckland and beyond.
To reach the light, we first have to go through a tunnel. I know our communities will, once again, join hands to make it through this difficult phase, and I know that in doing so we will eventually emerge into a brighter post-covid future.
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