Employers asked to pay staff wages while they self-isolate under test-and-trace plan
Employers should pay the wages of any staff told to self-isolate under England’s new coronavirus test-and-trace system, Health secretary Matt Hancock said today.
The programme is a key plank in the government’s strategy to lift lockdown and restart the economy.
From today, contacts of people who test positive for coronavirus will be asked to quarantine for 14 days, even if they have no symptoms.
Hancock told Sky News that employers were being asked to pay staff wages while they isolate.
“If you are instructed by the NHS, for public health reasons, to stay at home then that is the equivalent in employment law to being ill and it is very important that employers are flexible about this,” he said.
Hancock also said an accompanying tracing app, that is key to finding anonymous contacts, is ready but is not being brought in yet.
Yesterday Hancock said the introduction of the system was an “historic milestone” that will play a “big part” in exiting the coronavirus lockdown.
Close contact will be considered to have been made if someone has been within two metres of someone else for at least 15 minutes without any sort of protective equipment being involved.
The programme will have capacity for 200,000 tests a day.
The programme will be possible thanks to the recruitment of 25,000 contact tracers, which includes 7,000 medical professionals.
Hancock said it was everyone’s “civic duty” to use the test and trace programme if they have coronavirus symptoms.
“Test and trace means we can replace the lockdown with individual isolation for those who have been in contact with the virus and local action where it’s necessary to respond to a flare up,” Hancock said.
“Through testing we hunt down the virus finding out who is infected right now.”