COVID Recovery Group

Established on 10 November 2020, the group's aim is to challenge the use of blanket lockdown measures, and argue for a different approach to dealing with the pandemic that would enable society to "live with the virus".[1] It was rumoured that the application of Nigel Farage to rebrand with the Electoral Commission his Brexit Party as the Reform UK party helped spur the formation of group.[2] Said Baker: "We should not throw our prosperity away by shutting down and destroying our economy, and overlooking the untold health consequences caused by lockdowns."[2] Said Harper:

Lockdowns and restrictions cause immense economic, social and non-Covid health damage. ... At the moment, the cure we're prescribing runs the very real risk of being worse than the disease, and it's important that we base all our decisions as a country on informed scientific, economic and health data.

Among the group's objectives is for more research to be conducted into the economic impact of lockdown measures, and to challenge the scientific advice being given to government.[4] The group, which uses Whatsapp to coordinate its activities,[2] was formed by fifty MPs, but as of 11 November is composed of seventy MPs.[5][6] The members of the group's steering committee are:

The chief demand of the CRG on 10 November was that "ministers undertake and publish a full cost-benefit analysis of restrictions on a regional basis looking at the economic and health costs of a lockdown."[2] Said the CRG: ""MPs must be in a position to assess the relative health implications on both sides of the argument of repeated restrictions, with a view to removing them immediately if it cannot be proved that they are saving more lives than they cost."[2]

The second demand is "for ministers to end a monopoly on advice of government scientists, such as SAGE UK, and allow them to be challenged by competitive, multi-disciplinary expert groups. Said the CRG: "The Government should publish the models that inform policies so they can be reviewed by the public."[2]

The third demand is "to improve the measures we already have to tackle the virus, including significantly boosting the performance of NHS Test and Trace by shifting resources to local public health teams to lead contact tracing and break the chain of transmission."[2]

On 22 November 2020, the group wrote a letter to the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, saying they would only support further lockdown measures if the government published analysis showing that benefits of the lockdown exceeded the costs stating that there was a risk that the costs of the lockdown exceeded any benefit and that the Government had a burden to show that any restrictions were necessary.[7]

On 1 December 2020, Downing Street was trying to corral the group in anticipation of a vote it expected would be held later that day, in expectation that it would roll out to the general population the tiered measures on 2 December,[1] the day on which the restrictions then in place were set to expire.[2] The publication by HMG that was demanded by the CRG on 10 November was derided by many MPs as insufficient.[1] Harper said: "The Government's analysis seems to be collapsing under the glare of scrutiny. Before the current lockdown, incorrect death and hospital capacity modelling was leaked into the public domain to justify it. We have asked repeatedly for the information that vindicates these hospital projections and it has not been forthcoming. We are now seeing that, once again, the wheels are coming off the Government's arguments."[1]

Newton Abbott MP Anne-Marie Morris said: "There is nothing new in this document - it's just a rehash of data that has been published before. No attempt has been made to model the impact on the economy in the way that they have modelled the impact the tiers will have on Covid infections. I cannot support the Government in [the 1 December] vote, and everyone I know who has read the document is saying the same."[1]

Labour MPs were expected to abstain,[1] and the Daily Telegraph published an editorial in which the economic forecast demanded by the CRG was described as a "disappointing dossier", and a "thin piece of analysis", which contained "fantasy counterfactual" and "questionable assumptions". "Crucially, it fails to address the relative economic impact of being placed in different tiers... Before [the restrictions] are enacted, the public is entitled to a more honest assessment of the consequences than ministers have deigned to give them thus far."[8] Overall, 55 Conservative MPs voted against the government, 16 did not vote for it. Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and 14 Labour MPs voted against the government.[9][10]

In November 2020 the group received £9,500 to employ a media consultant, funded by an anonymous individual and Risk Capital Partners (Luke Johnson's investment firm).[11]