BORIS JOHNSON is facing a back-bench revolt over government plans for a new, stricter three-tier system of anti-Covid controls over Christmas to replace England’s current lockdown.

Seventy Tory MPs from the so-called Covid Recovery Group (CRD) are reported to have called for a “cost-benefit analysis” of further coronavirus restrictions being imposed when the full lockdown ends on December 2.

The Prime Minister is expected to announce the government’s “winter Covid plan” today, but on Saturday,the CRG said that it “cannot support” further measures unless ministers prove that they “will save more lives than they cost.”

In a letter to the PM, they wrote: “We cannot live under such a series of damaging lockdowns and apparently arbitrary restrictions and expect our constituents to be grateful for being let out to enjoy the festive season, only to have strict restrictions imposed on them afterwards that cause them health problems and destroy their livelihoods.”