Oldham could be the next town forced back into lockdown after it recorded the country’s third-highest infection rate. Bars, shops and restaurants could be ordered to shut just after reopening as a government task force sent to the town reports to Downing Street on Thursday.
Council leaders claim it would devastate struggling businesses and make no difference to the spread of the virus, which they say is travelling between family groups and not by people “going for a pint”.
In one area of the town a single extended family is believed to be behind a cluster of 30 infections. Council leader Sean Fielding feared a lockdown was imminent.