Letter to the Prime Minister – ensure second lockdown protects rights

We wrote to the Prime Minster to recommend a number of measures to ensure that everyone’s rights are protected during a second lockdown.

The recommendations include:

• A clear ‘sunset clause’ in the law requiring new restrictions to end on Wednesday 2 December, so any extension must be properly scrutinised
• Additional police enforcement powers should be minimal
• All self-isolating workers should receive full sick pay, and ‘clinically extremely vulnerable’ workers should receive full sick pay if they can’t work from home
• People must not lose their homes
• Local authorities must have the funding to maintain or enhance their social care provision
• There must be funding to ensure homeless people can access safe and suitable accommodation, regardless of their immigration status.
• Refuges and domestic violence services must have funding to meet increasing levels of need
• Charging migrants for NHS services must stop, as well as data-sharing for immigration enforcement purposes, and the ‘no recourse to public funds’ rule should be suspended