Derby to move to Tier 4 ‘stay at home’ alert level

Published: 30 December 2020

The government has announced that Derby and various other parts of England will be placed under the newly created Tier 4 restrictions from Thursday 31 December at 00.01am, following a countrywide rise in COVID cases.

Areas placed under Tier 4 (the highest COVID alert level) are those with rapidly rising case numbers. Restrictions are similar to national lockdown rules, with citizens urged to stay at home apart from for essential reasons.

In Tier 4, we must not leave or be outside of our homes or gardens except where we have a ‘reasonable excuse’. A reasonable excuse includes:

• Work and volunteering: You can leave home for work purposes, where your place of work remains open and where you cannot work from home
• Essential activities: You can leave home to buy things at shops or obtain services from a business which is permitted to open in your Tier 4 area, but you should stay local. For instance you can leave home to buy food or medicine, or to collect any items - including food or drink - ordered through click-and-collect or as a takeaway, to obtain or deposit money (e.g. from a bank or post office), or to access critical public services
• Fulfilling legal obligations: You may leave home to fulfil legal obligations, or to carry out activities related to buying, selling, letting or renting a residential property
• Education and childcare: You can leave home for education related to the formal curriculum or training, registered childcare, under-18 sport and physical activity, and supervised activities for children that are necessary to allow parents/carers to work, seek work, or undertake education or training. Parents can still take their children to school, and people can continue existing arrangements for contact between parents and children where they live apart. This includes childcare bubbles
• Meeting others and care: You can leave home to visit people in your support bubble, or to provide informal childcare for children aged 13 and under as part of a childcare bubble, to provide care for vulnerable people, to provide emergency assistance, attend a support group (of up to 15 people), or for respite care where that care is being provided to a vulnerable person or a person with a disability, or is a short break in respect of a looked after child
• Exercise and recreation: People can exercise outdoors or visit some public outdoor places, such as parks, the countryside accessible to the public, public gardens or outdoor sports facilities. You can continue to do unlimited exercise alone, or in a public outdoor place with your household, support bubble, or one other person
• Medical reasons, harm and compassionate visits: You can leave home for a medical reason, including to get a COVID-19 test, for medical appointments and emergencies, to be with someone who is giving birth, to avoid injury or illness or to escape risk of harm (such as domestic abuse), or for animal welfare reasons – such as to attend veterinary services for advice or treatment. You can also leave home to visit someone who is dying or someone in a care home (if permitted under care home guidance), hospice, or hospital, or to accompany them to a medical appointment
• Communal worship and life events: You can leave home to attend a place of worship for communal worship, a funeral or a related event for someone who has died, or to visit a burial ground or a remembrance garden, or to attend a wedding ceremony - but funerals, linked events and weddings are all subject to limits on the numbers that can attend
• Meeting others safely: In general, you must not meet with another person socially or undertake any activities with another person. However, you can exercise or meet in a public outdoor place with people you live with, your support bubble (or as part of a childcare bubble), or with one other person. You must not meet socially indoors with family or friends unless they are part of your household or support bubble. You cannot meet people in a private garden, unless you live with them or have formed a support bubble with them
• Support and childcare bubbles: There is separate guidance for support bubbles and childcare bubbles across all tiers. You can form a support bubble with another household if you are eligible. You may need to change your support bubble if your circumstances change. Find out more about changing your support bubble.
• Meeting in larger groups: There are still circumstances in which you are allowed to meet others from outside your household or support bubble in larger groups, but this should not be for socialising and only for permitted purposes. This includes for work, education and funerals (up to 30 people). A full list is available online.

The police can take action against you if you meet in larger groups. This includes breaking up illegal gatherings and issuing fines (fixed penalty notices).

You can be given a Fixed Penalty Notice of £200 for the first offence, doubling for further offences up to a maximum of £6,400. If you hold, or are involved in holding, an illegal gathering of over 30 people, the police can issue fines of £10,000.

All restrictions are monitored and evaluated by the government, Public Health England and local councils to ensure they are still necessary and appropriate for the area. A review of each local area tier placement will take place every two weeks.

Dr Robyn Dewis, Director of Public Health, Derby City Council, said:

With COVID cases growing, particularly in light of the new variant, these severe restrictions are unfortunately necessary for us to regain control of the virus.

It is incredibly important that we continue to carefully consider our own actions in the run up to moving into Tier 4. While we are not yet under the ‘Stay at Home’ measures, we need to do all we can to protect ourselves and our loved ones. 

Our fight back against COVID continues despite the measures in place. We do hope that as we go into 2021 our rollout of community testing and the national vaccine programme will help Derby move back into eased measures as soon as it is safe for us to do so.

Community support will be available to those who need it. Derby’s Community Hub can be contacted on 01332 640000. A text service is also available using 07774 333412.

You can read more details about the system and what each tier entails on the government website.

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