Robert Peston

It’s not as though Jeremy Corbyn wasn’t put on warning. Well he would have been put on warning, if he had bothered to wait even five minutes before putting out his own statement in response to the EHRC verdict that Labour on his watch had made ‘serious’ failures in tackling anti-Semitism. Because his successor Sir

As far as I can gather, the EU has only one genuinely non-negotiable red line that could prevent a resumption of talks on a free trade agreement with the UK – which will be made clear by its negotiator Michel Barnier in a telephone call on Monday with the UK negotiator David Frost. Barnier and

It is important to understand the gap between the Prime Minister and the scientists on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) because it is huge. On 21 September, when evidence was accumulating that infections were on the rise, Sage recommended a series of national measures. These included the closures of pubs and restaurants or an even more

The new three tier ‘Covid alert levels’ unveiled by the PM are supposed to help all of us better understand how and why our freedoms are being restricted, and improve compliance, at a time when both infection levels and suppressive measures are significantly different across England and across the UK. But it is not clear

We are at a critical moment in the second surge of coronavirus. Ministers, scientists and officials are deeply concerned about the rate at which Covid-19 is increasing in the North West, North East and Yorkshire and Humberside: they believe the daily quantum of infection is doubling every five to seven days in large chunks of northern

Probably the most significant feature of Boris Johnson’s speech at the Tory conference is what it said about him rather than what he said. To put it another way, the Prime Minister seemed bouncier than he has in many months, thanks — he said — to shedding 26 pounds of flab since falling seriously ill

In Kate Bingham’s interview with the Financial Times, where she says that vaccinating the whole population is ‘not going to happen’ and would be ‘misguided’, she is deferring the holy grail of herd immunity for months beyond next spring, and saying we will be living with the virus for years. Because as chair of the

Rishi Sunak’s Job Support Scheme may represent the most ambitious programme to socialise or nationalise work in British history – because at a time when so many companies face bleak demand for their goods and services, it subsidises employers to put their staff on short hours, or turn them into part-time workers, as an alternative

The Prime Minister announced a raft of measures that will significantly delay the UK’s economic recovery, but whose impact on the spread of coronavirus is profoundly uncertain. The important point is that there is only one significant new measure, namely closing pubs and restaurants between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m. Pretty much everything else is

Probably the most interesting new bit of information we received today on Covid-19 was from Sir Patrick Vallance, the chief scientific adviser, who implied that he and the government are now assuming that fewer than one in 200 people who are infected with the virus will die. That still means this form of coronavirus is

I’ve been bombarded with emails and messages from data scientists who firmly believe that the trend to Covid-19 infections, based on when a specimen was taken, is flattening or even falling. On the basis of that analysis, they are convinced the government is overreacting by threatening to impose new social distancing measures. And if you

Later today, the ONS coronavirus survey will confirm that Covid-19 is on the march again everywhere, not just in regional pockets — though there are regional variations. And it will also show that infection is rising in all age groups, though the incidence of the illness is highest by a margin among those aged 17

Significant further restrictions on our freedom to mix with people, in social or work settings, could be introduced in a fortnight, if the ‘rule of six’ does not lead to behavioural change and a flattening of the coronavirus infection rate. I have spoken to members of the government and to its scientific advisers, and am

A senior Tory tells me the House of Lords will turn the Salisbury-Addison convention – which says the upper house won’t block legislation that stems from a government’s election manifesto – on its head, when it comes to the two bills amending the Withdrawal Agreement. He points out that the Tory manifesto describes Boris Johnson’s