The Prime Minister was almost one of them, as the Global Pandemic landed too close to home. It left him with questions to answer. 65,000 people have lost their lives because of covid 19. The Prime Ministershould welcome challenge that can save lives rather than complaining about it. It was a crisis that overturned centuries of tradition to change the way westminster works, with unexpected results. And the bbc are also now embracing this. I apologise for my cats tail. Why are you not doing this by default . On wednesday afternoon in late january Health Minister was summoned to the house of lords to answer an urgent question on what was described as the wuhan Novel Coronavirus a threat to uk citizens. It was the first reference in parliament to what was to become a Global Pandemic that has cost tens of thousands of lives here in the uk. Hundreds of thousands worldwide. The minister, lady blackwood, tried to reassure peers. We are monitoring closely the development of this virus. Advice from Public Health england and the chief medical officer is that the risk to the uk is currently low. The uk is well prepared for the emergence of novel viruses. The following day her boss, the health secretary, came to a sparsely attended commons, before social distancing restrict numbers, to tell mps that englands chief medical officer had revised the risk to the uk population from very low to low. While there is an increased likelihood that cases may arise in this country, we are well prepared and well equipped to deal with them. The uk is one of the first countries to have developed a world leading test for the new coronavirus. The World Health Organization has warned that countries are, quote, simply not ready for a pandemic, and there has now been significant spread of the virus across the european continent, italy in particular, but other cases have been identified in austria, croatia, and switzerland. This is clearly now a very, very serious. Matt hancock updates became a regular feature of commons life is the virus spread. The Prime Minister delivered his own Public Health message. You have got to do two verses. Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, dear. Six days later, against the downing street backdrop that became increasingly familiar, the tone had changed. I must level with you, level with the british public. More families, many more families, are going to lose loved ones before their time. Lockdown arrived ten days later. Our instruction is simple. Stay at home. Madame deputy speaker, we are engaged in a Great National effort. Everybody now has it in their power to save lives and protect the nhs. Home is now the frontline. Mps and peers soon got a taste of working from home themselves, as Parliament Brought forward and extended its easter break, but not before rushing through what is now the coronavirus act, having sweeping Emergency Powers to the police, local councils, and the nations of the uk. Coronavirus is the most serious Public Health emergency that has faced the world in a century. We are all targets, but the disease reserves its full cruelty for the weakest and the most vulnerable, and to defeat it, we are proposing extraordinary measures of the kind never seen before in peacetime. Today, this house is being asked to make decisions of a magnitude i simply would never have dreamt of only a few weeks ago. And i know no member came into this place to put powers like this on the statute book. There were some voices. Nobody denies this bill is necessary, but given that this bill gives unprecedented powers to the state to enforce isolation on people who have committed no crime, for the first time in our history, will the secretary of state reassure the house that this house will be fully involved in renewing this once this crisis is over, and there wont be any drift in this matter . There were fears the nhs might be overwhelmed by visitors. We have one acute hospital in inverness. Some of these tourist destinations are more than three hours from inverness. We have been absolutely inundated with people that showed no concern for the local population. The act covers everything from the management of dead bodies to the closure of schools in the postponement of parliamentary by elections. It was passed in just four sitting days, with an air of resigned acceptance, in both commons and the lords. Fundamentally, this bill is about buying time. You may not think it, looking at those alarming graphs charting the growth of the disease, but time can help us. With each day that passes, the science is getting better. Her majestys loyal opposition supports this bill. In normal times it would be utterly u na cce pta ble. These are not normal times. And as a result, we are notjust faced with this bill, but we must consider how we as a parliament operate in the weeks and months ahead. Parliament then disappeared for an extended easter break. When it returned, it was very different. Only 50 mps were allowed in the socially distanced house of commons. Others could contribute via videoconferencing. In the lords, the lord speaker vacated and was self isolating. Today, all of our proceedings will be conducted virtually and will be available for broadcasters. As a matter of interest, i am chairing proceedings from my home in the isle of wight. Mps usually vote by crowding into either of two corridors alongside the chamber. It takes about 50 minutes for the result to be declared. A first attempt at a new remote system or the chancellor accidentally vote against his own government. Later, a new form of chamber voting lead to an mps conger around the palace of westminster in a division that took a0 minutes and proved a challenge for some. Stephen crabb, no. Aye Stephen Crabb wasnt alone. That confusing Chamber Voting System was soon replaced by swipe cards, with proxy votes available for mps unable to attend. Pa rliaments extended break had seen its own drama. The Prime Minister almost died from coronavirus. Initially, borisjohnson had self isolated in downing street after developing what he said were mild symptoms. Hi, folks. I want to bring you up to speed on something that is happening today, which is that i have developed mild symptoms of the coronavirus. Thats to say a temperature and a persistent cough. And a few days later he was rushed to hospital in central london, before being moved to intensive care, where he spent three nights. When mps returned from their recess, dominic raab was taking Prime Ministers questions. Thank you very much, mr speaker. Ive been asked to respond on behalf of my right honourable friend the Prime Minister, and i am pleased to tell the house that he is making a good recovery and is in good spirits. At the time borisjohnson returned to work, he had a new opponent. Sir keir starmer, a Senior Lawyer in a past life, had been elected leader of the opposition. At question time each week you challenge the Prime Minister over his handling of the pandemic, here over plans to track and trace those with the virus. The Prime Minister wrist making mistakes he made at the beginning of the pandemic, brushing aside challenge, dashing forward, not estimating properly the risks. If two thirds of those with covid 19 are not being contacted, that is a big problem. Yesterday the right honourable gentleman was kind enough, actually, to say that he supported our policy and supported our programme. I seem to remember him saying that loud and clear, yesterday. Today, as i say, i understand the constraints of the profession in which he used to work, i know how it works, today he appears to be your going back into a position of opposition. Which is it . Is he supporting what were doing or is he against it . I do support the next stage of the operation, but the Prime Minister is wrong to reject challenge. 65,000 people have lost their lives because of covid 19. The Prime Minister should welcome challenge that could save lives rather than complaining about it. Back that figure of 65,000 refers to access deaths overall. Keir starmer pursued his argument at later question time s after the lockdown eased and the hairdressers reopened. The Prime Minister must recognise that huge mistakes have been made. Two months ago at pmqs, i highlighted the weaknesses of early guidance on care homes. The Prime Minister, typically flippant, simply said it is not true. There were repeated warnings from the care sector, repeated delays in providing protective equipment. This wasnt hindsight. They were raised here day in, day out, week in, week out. It wasnt hindsight. It was real time for the frontline. Same on testing, and the decision to discharge 20,000 people to care homes without test was clearly a mistake. Our understanding of the disease changed dramatically in the months that we had it, and when he looks at the action plan that we brought in to help our care workers, i think he would appreciate the vast amount of work that they have done, the ppe that they have been supplied with, the testing that they have been supplied with, that has helped them to get the incidence of the disease down to record lows. Borisjohnson was later to qualify that defence of his record. The Health Crisis swiftly became an economic one, with the bank of england predicting the deepest recession for 300 years. Sunak had been chancellor for barely a month before he delivered his first budget in march, one dominated by the pandemic. At the time, Jeremy Corbyn was still the opposition leader. Whatever extra resources our nhs needs to cope with coronavirus it will get. So, whether its research for a vaccine, recruiting thousands of returning staff, or supporting our brilliant doctors and nurses, whether its millions of pounds or billions of pounds, whatever it needs, whatever it costs, we stand behind our nhs. But opposition leaders wanted more. We are going into this crisis with our Public Services on their knees. And, as todays figures confirm, with a fundamentally weak economy, which is now flatlining, with zero growth, even before the impact of coronavirus. Many of the businesses on my part of the world, in the highlands of scotland, come through a fallow period over the winter, and it is notjust an issue that they are going to see a reduction in business. In some cases they are going to be desperately short of cash coming in through the door. Before the ink was dry on his budget, the chancellor was writing more checks, spending hundreds of billions of pounds, including a furlough scheme that saw the government pay the wages of workers laid off due to the crisis. He was back in the commons in early july, with what the government insisted was a summer statement rather than a mini budget, and an eye catching scheme to get the economy going again. For the month of august, we will give everyone in the country and eat out to help out discount. Meals eaten at any participating business monday to wednesday will be 50 off up to a maximum discount of £10 per head for everyone. Labour were a underwhelmed with the overall package. Today, britons should have had a back to work budget. But instead we got this summer statement, with many of the Big Decisions put off until later. What others liked the chancellors menu. Im sure that the Hospitality Industry will welcome the measures that he has announced today, albeit that they are quite time limited. I think the clothes shops were like them as well, because once we have made our way through a months half price meals, we may well be visiting them. Sammy wilson, on a scheme some have labelled, in an echo of housing policies, as help to pyre. Borisjohnson was not the only cabinet member to contract coronavirus. It also hit matt hancock and the Prime Ministers controversialaide, dominic cummings. Mr cummings was accused of breaking the rules by driving to north east england lockdown. He refused to resign, but told an unusual press conference in the downing street garden his wife had been worried about their return journey. She said and i think it was perfectly reasonable, three days ago you could barely stand up, you said your eyesight was weird. We shouldntjust embark on a 270 whatever it is mile journey and then end up finding halfway through that you actually cant drive that far. Good afternoon. Scotlands chief medical officer Catherine Calderwood did resign after making two trips to her second home. Northern irelands deputy first minister sinn feins Michelle Oneill based calls to quit after attending the large funeral of a former ira figure. Professor lockdown in some newspapers, did resign as a government advisor after it emerged he had been visited by his girlfriend during the lockdown. Professor ferguson became a household name. The uk government chief medical and scientific a offices were often seen flanking the Prime Minister at downing street press conferences. They were in demand from parliamentary committees, too. If every year in seasonal flu, the number of deaths is thought to be about eight thousand excess deaths. So if we can get this down to numbers 20000 and below, thats a good outcome in terms of but it is still horrible. It is still an enormous number of deaths. By the end of april, more than 20,000 people had died from coronavirus. Politicians and scientists began asking if we had locked down too late. Had we introduced lockdown measures earlier, we would have reduced our final death toll by at least a half. The measures, given what we know about this new, what we knew about the virus and then, in terms of its transmission, where warranted. Certainly had we introduced it earlier, we would have seen many fewer deaths. That was the science committee. Mps on the health and social Care Committee were asking similar questions. So when it comes to the timing of the lock down, are you content that the government followed your advice in terms of the staging of different elements of the lockdown . I am content and so what you are trying to do is run a very comp period. As a veryjumped on question. There is no straight answer to that and i am not trying to give you a yes or no answer to that. Its not an unreasonable question to ask because the government said they we re ask because the government said they were following the science, so im asking you on the crucial question, we re asking you on the crucial question, were they following your advice . I am confident, the ministers at the time, in my view, followed the advice, given, by sage, which were clearly signposted through the minutes, with a delay that was no more than you would reasonably expect for what are really difficult things to operationalised. Byjuly, Patrick Vallance admitted things could have gone better. The uks response to the pandemic is not the most in the world, back and put it that way. In your role, have you begun to think about what might be the reasons for that. Yes, we think about that a lot and clearly there are things that we do as we go along to learn what is going on and we are in regular contact with Many International partners. I think it is very difficult to know exactly where we stand at the moment. It is clear that the outcome has not been good in the uk. England, wales, scotland and Northern Ireland, all ended lockdown together in march. There was much talk about a four nations approach but with different parties in charge of the lockdown rules in the four different nations, the uk began to look like a federal state. Some of the issues were familiar, wherever you live. In scotland, more people died from the virus in care homes that in hospitals. Mistakes were made at the start and they have led to the excess deaths that we see today. First minister, in light of the tragedy, you agree that when it comes to testing in care homes that by any standards, this is a failure . First minister. No, i dont. Let me say, i am not even speaking as first minister here, i am speaking as a human being. I deeply regret every single death from this virus and i think all of us are in that position, but i also know and i said i think the very first time i stood in this chamber and talked about what we were dealing with, i said that mistakes would be made. I said i would make mistakes, the government would make mistakes, we are dealing with an unprecedented situation and i am sure that this is the case was there is not a day, probably not an ally goes by right now, where i dont question myself, i dont agonise over the decisions we are taking to make sure that we are learning as we go and we are getting these decisions as right as possible and i suspect everybody, i hope everybody in our leadership position, the world over right now, is going through that same process. And Nicola Sturgeon turned that questioning approach to her counterpart in downing street. When so much is at stake as it is right now, we cannot allow ourselves to be dragged down in a week of the governments to be quite frank, shambolic Decision Making process was up as the pressure grew to lift the lockdown, in Northern Ireland, democratic unions first minister and the Sinn Fein Deputy first minister gave a rare joint statement at stormont. As of today, we remain subject to restrictions which no one wants to last a day longer than is absolutely necessary. These are measures we would not contemplate in normal times. We know that they are having a significant effect on peoples ability to live their lives the way they and we want. We are appealing to the public to please be patient. We understand that you want your family life back. To be able to visit and socialise with your friends and your families, to give your grandchildren a hug. The differences between the four countries were most apparent as the lockdown was lifted. With scotland and wales more cautious than the uk government in england. Your careful approach in terms of easing of restrictions has served well in many ways but you know, i think, risk treading the line between being too cautious and too slow on this issue. Why is wales lagging behind and so many countries have acted so decisively . Ijust reject the language of lagging behind. We are doing the things that are right for wales. But does not mean following anybody else just because they have done something that we have decided not to do. Westminster and the uks other parliaments continue to adjust to their new normal. Select committees carried on largely virtually with some unusual cameos. And the bbc are also now embracing this, i apologise for my cat s tail. Why are you not doing this by default . Rocco, put your tail down. The hybrid parliament are still allowed mps and peers to contribute from their home, the office or wherever they happened to be. I wonder if i might ask my noble friend what engagement she has had with the devolved administration regarding any participation and any future scheme . My lord, i am dying to know what the other passengers on the noble lords train ourthinking. Were going to go to the lord a moment and you will be surprised because he is when a seatbelt and that is because he is coming back from an important family engagement. He hoped to get home in time. Do you think first that a change of present would make life more difficult for you or do you think it is having repercussions and joe biden is currently looking more likely to win over my trump. We are working with both republicans and democrats in the United States to make sure there is bipartisan support for a us trade deal. I was going to say that was a very good answer . Safe journey home is all i can say. Ina taxi. Returning from a restaurant. A good one, apparently. Byjuly, almost six months after the first confirmed case in the uk, the Prime Minister spoke briefly about a return to normality by christmas. The scientists were sceptical. Things will not be done by christmas. This infection is not going away. It is now a human endemic infection and even actually if we have a vaccine a very good treatments, humanity will still be living with this virus for very many years to come. The key objective remains to develop a vaccine. Initial trials were encouraging, up to a point. Are we going to have a vaccine before christmas . Well, i am an optimist in life, catherine, and on the best case scenario, the answer is yes and myjob is not to second guess whether we will not and vaccines are an uncertain science and we need to be cautious and we need to be careful. We are working very hard on this that i cant, i cant promise to play centre. Matt hancocks natural optimism struggling to overcome the reality of the calendar. This was a crisis that began with ministers and their advisers confident the risks to the uk was low but, six months later, saw borisjohnson admitted his government hadnt really understood the virus in its early days. The Prime Minister now says there are very open questions about whether lives could have been saved i entering lockdown sooner. With the death toll approaching 50,000, the families of those who have died from coronavirus will be looking for answers in the independent enquiry that will follow. Hello there. Part two of the weekend and a little bit cooler and fresher today than what we had yesterday and there was still some warmth in the air yesterday across the south east in particular. Today sunshine and showers, some of those showers will be heavy and most of them across Northern Areas because of this weather front here moving in from the west. As we head through this evening and overnight, the showers associated with that front should tend to ease down, and there will still be a couple dotted around but there will be lengthy clear skies and with light winds, a slightly cooler air mass, it will be a chillier night to come. Temperatures in single figures across a few central and Northern Areas. But tending to hold onto double figures across the south. This upcoming week will be quite mixed. Starting off unsettled with quite a bit of rain across Northern Areas and then the second half of the week, well start to see High Pressure build back in and that will warm things up again, particularly across the south where we will see temperatures again into the 30s celsius. Monday is pretty similar to how it has been today. Sunshine and showers most of the showers developing will be across central and Northern Areas and we could also see some heavier ones developing across the east into lincolnshire and east anglia. There could be the odd thundery one too. Across the south, it should stay dry, top temperatures 22 degrees, mid to high teens in the north, so on the cool side. Monday night, it will be cooler still, that cooler air mass and clear skies and temperatures may drop into the single figures fairly widely. Just some towns and cities holding onto double figures. Clouds and rain will start to build in across Northern Ireland, that is because the next area of low pressure moving in. That will bring windy weather to northern and Western Areas and also quite a lot of rain, initially to Northern Ireland on tuesday morning, and then spreading into all parts of scotland. And that rain will be persistent and heavy across the highlands, for example. The winds are strong around the irish sea coast, gusting at 30 or a0 mph perhaps for western wales. Disappointing temperatures where you have the rain, but in the south east where it will stay dry, some sunshine and feeling a little warmer. We have a weather front bringing wetter windier weather on wednesday and then High Pressure building in towards the end of the week, we start to tap into some warmth from the near continent. It will be a wet day again on wednesday for northern and Western Areas, fairly strong winds, but temperatures begin to climb, especially for england and wales. This is bbc news with the latest headlines a former conservative minister and current mp is arrested the government insists that further coronavirus restrictions will be targeted locally. Theres a lot of speculation about what might happen in the future, but what were concentrating on is a targeted rather than a blanket approach. The australian state of victoria declares a state of disaster and imposes new lockdown measures after a surge in coronavirus infections. Heading home the space x capsule leaves the International Space station, destination, splash down off the coast of florida. And us Infectious Disease chief Dr Anthony Fauci speaks to the bbc as cases continue to rise across america