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Labour accuses government of 'flip-flopping' over review of family lockdown fines

LABOUR criticised the government’s refusal today to review fixed-penalty notices issued to parents who travelled for childcare in the light of the much-criticised Durham road trip by Downing Street “Spad” Dominic Cummings.

When Health Secretary Matt Hancock was asked during Tuesday’s press briefing if all police fines handed to families who had similarly travelled during lockdown for childcare purposes could be reviewed, he said that he would discuss it with the Treasury.

But Downing Street sources later insisted that there would be no review, which the questioner, the Rev Martin Poole from Brighton, said was “a little disappointing.”

Shadow home secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds said Home Secretary Priti Patel urgently needed to answer Mr Poole’s question. 

“It’s now been made incredibly difficult to police vital public-health guidance, as this flip-flop over fines shows,” Mr Thomas-Symonds said.

“The reality is: it’s one rule for the most powerful people in government and another for the rest of us, which is incredibly dangerous.”

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