In the northern English city of Manchester, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has become embroiled in a row with local mayor Andy Burnham over whether to move the UK’s second-tier ban city to its most intense third level.
“If no agreement can be reached, I will need to intervene to protect Manchester’s hospitals and save the lives of Manchester residents,” Johnson said Friday, urging Burnham to “reconsider his position” and “constructively engage” with the government.
But Burnham has resisted the government’s efforts to step up its city action, calling for more financial measures to protect workers in the sector, which has been placed under tougher rules.
As the row escalated on Sunday, Michael Gove, a member of Johnson’s cabinet, told Burnham to “put aside for a moment the political position they have imposed.”
“I want them to work with us to ensure that we save lives and protect the NHS … Instead of holding a press conference and saving people’s lives, we need what we need,” Gove said as part of the negotiations between the two. The teams continued.
Tensions have soared since the UK’s first coronavirus peak, when its four nations essentially went into a lockdown in unison, and regional officials and the public were compensated.
Instead, there is confusion in some parts of the country as to what rules they need to follow, depending on their local authority’s willingness to follow government instructions.
In London, Mayor Sadiq Khan had been calling for stricter rules for several days before Johnson announced them, while in Liverpool, Lan Lancashire and other regions, a deal had been agreed with the government earlier in the week, with some councilors expressing disdain for the order. Was.
But even where local leaders are right for stricter rules, people are less visible.
A similar scenario is looming in Europe as the Navy struggles to adopt a “wake-a-mole” approach to slow the spread of the Covid-19.
The court said the ban on living in the capital and nine suburbs last Friday “interfered with the fundamental rights of citizens without a legal order.”
Spain’s left-wing national government and Madrid’s center-right regional administration have long been concerned with the response to the epidemic, and lockdown measures are the latest political battleground.
And in Germany, many court orders are also causing trouble for Angela Merkel’s government as it tries to fight the growing number of cases.
Most importantly, a Berlin court suspended a late-night curfew on bars and restaurants in the city, in front of the government and with a group of business owners on Friday.
“It was not clear” that closing food and beverage establishments between 11pm and 6am would help fight the infection, the court said in the case. The move, which took effect on October 10, was a “disproportionate encroachment” on the hospitality industry, the court said.
Health Minister Jens Spah said he was disappointed with the verdict, saying “there is no doubt that what happens in big cities … especially in the late hours, in private and public places, is the driver of the current infection According to.
Emmanuel Macron will keep a close eye on arguments taking place across Europe after curfews were imposed in Paris and several other French cities affected on Friday. So far, the French government has not strongly opposed the plan.
In addition to protests from local legislators and aggressive business owners, the question of policing is causing confusion in some areas.
The chief constable of the Greater Manchester Police reacted strongly to a report in the Telegraph newspaper on Saturday, claiming that there were “fears” that officers would follow Burnham’s lead and refuse to take mandatory action by Johnson’s government.
“We conduct operational policing without fear or favor and with colleagues across the country in compliance with the Police Service Code of Conduct,” Hon Hopkins said in a statement.
But the barrage of challenges from the council and the hospitality industry are causing headaches for some European governments.
Meanwhile, cases are steadily rising across the continent. The UK, Germany, Italy, Poland and the Czech Republic, along with other countries, all recorded their most confirmed covid 19 infections in October, as leaders warned of a possible severe winter epidemic.
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