Coronavirus: No 'dramatic overnight change' planned for UK's lockdown, minister warns
With the PM due to update the country on Sunday, the environment secretary says the UK is "not out of the woods" with coronavirus.
Friday 8 May 2020 20:12, UK
There will not be any "dramatic overnight change" of the UK's lockdown rules, a cabinet minister has warned.
Speaking at the daily Downing Street press conference, Environment Secretary George Eustice said the UK is "not out of the woods" and there are "still major challenges" during the coronavirus pandemic.
With the prime minister due to update the country on Sunday, Mr Eustice said ministers needed to be "very very cautious as we loosen the restrictions we have".
He added: "We will be living with this virus for some time to come and it's therefore important to avoid that second peak that could overwhelm our NHS."
He said Boris Johnson would "set out effectively a roadmap of how we can evolve the current restrictions".
Earlier, First Minister Mark Drakeford said Wales would remain in lockdown for another three weeks to avoid "a return of the virus."
But restrictions will be eased slightly from Monday, with people being allowed to exercise outside more than once a day and garden centres reopening.
In Scotland, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said the only change being considered "in the immediate term" was about allowing longer than one hour of outdoor exercise a day.
Mr Eustice has also announced that charities will be given £16m to help provide food for those who are struggling because of COVID-19.
At least 5,000 frontline groups in England will benefit, and it will cover rural areas as well as cities.
The environment secretary said that more than one million food parcels had been delivered to so far to the clinically vulnerable.
He said in the Downing Street briefing: "In addition all of those in the shielded cohort have been added to a list giving them priority access to supermarket delivery slots.
"So far around 400,000 people have been offered priority delivery slots by supermarkets and around one million orders have been placed."
Volunteers using the NHS Good Samaritan app had carried out 79,000 shopping runs, he added.
Mr Eustice said that permitting wider attendance at funerals is something the UK government is "looking at closely", adding: "We are very conscious that this is an incredibly sensitive matter.
"People want the opportunity to pay their last respects. Obviously we have to be very conscious of large social gatherings, but it is something we are giving consideration to."
Asked about fast food outlets, the environment secretary said he thought it was "quite possible for these venues to reopen and reopen safely - we never mandated that they should close".
He added that some of them could perhaps learn lessons from how supermarkets have been operating during the pandemic.