Star date: 14th October 2020

SALFORD CITY COUNCIL MOONSHOT PROGRAMME HAS BEEN ON PAUSE

As rumours swirl around that Salford and Greater Manchester may be put into the Tier 3, Very High restriction strata, the city has 163 new confirmed cases of coronavirus, bringing the cumulative total to 4,901. Salford Royal Hospital has announced three new virus-related new deaths.

Meanwhile, Salford and Eccles MP Rebecca Long Bailey revealed in the House of Commons last night that Salford Council's 'Moonshot' saliva testing scheme had been put on pause until yesterday. Questions remain about why Salford Mayor Paul Dennett has not kept the community informed.

Full details here...

Salford has 163 new confirmed cases of coronavirus, bringing the cumulative total to 4,901, up from the previous day's 4,738. Salford Royal Hospital has announced three new virus-related new deaths.

Elsewhere in Greater Manchester, cases in Manchester rose to 13,359 (up from 12,958), followed by Bolton 6,530 (up from 6,343), Oldham with 5,850 (up from 5,683), Wigan 5,683 (up from 5,422), Rochdale 5,049 (up from 4,872), Tameside 4,318 (up from 4,156), Stockport 4,267 (up from 4,127), Trafford 3,799 (up from 3,689) and Bury 3,930 (up from 3,806).

With such huge sustained rises in cases, rumours are swirling around, fired by SKY News, that Salford and Greater Manchester are soon to be put into Tier 3, the Very High, strata of restrictions.

In response, Greater Manchester Mayor, Andy Burnham tweeted: "Disappointing that the Government is piling the pressure on GM in this way without negotiating. It risks confusing people coming so soon after the Tier 2 announcement. Our view is unchanged: unfunded restrictions are unfair and will cause real damage to lives, jobs and businesses..."

Local MPs are backing Keir Starmer's call for a two week 'circuit breaker' lockdown, with Worsley and Eccles South MP Barbara Keeley tweeting "If we follow the science and break the circuit, we can get this virus under control. If we do not, we could sleep walk into a long and bleak winter. That's why Labour is calling for a circuit break in England – to protect the NHS, fix testing and get control of the virus."

Speaking in the House of Commons last night, Salford and Eccles MP Rebecca Long Bailey also backed the call, arguing that the Government's response so far to the pandemic was "akin to throwing a glass of water on a chip pan fire"...

She also revealed that the much lauded £100billion Moonshot saliva testing programme that was to be trialled in Salford has, until yesterday, been put on pause by the Government. In September, the Salford Star revealed that a group of lawyers and medics were trying to take the Government to court to get answers on both the mass testing technology "that doesn't even exist yet" and how contracts have been awarded (see here)...

"Salford was to be one of the pilot areas testing this Moonshot programme" the Salford MP said in the Commons "However my local council confirmed to me this morning that some time ago now they'd asked the Department for Health to share the clinical validity data behind this new technology. To date this query remains unanswered. And until this morning, Salford City Council had been told to pause the programme..."

Questions remain about why the community has had to learn this information from a Salford MP's speech in the House of Commons, rather than directly from the Salford City Mayor, Paul Dennett.

In keeping with the total lack of information from Salford City Council throughout the pandemic, yesterday, as politicians raged about the next steps to control the virus and help citizens get through the crisis, the City Mayor was tweeting about solar panels in Little Hulton and a hydro scheme in Charlestown...