ON the day Government staff were allegedly celebrating at a party in Downing Street last year, the North East was struggling to cope with the devastating impact of Covid-19.
Families were unable to say goodbye to dying loved ones, socialising was off limits and anyone who broke the rules faced strict sanctions from the authorities.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson has denied the event on December 18 ever took place but has ordered an investigation, and told MPs he was “furious” about footage apparently showing aides joking about it.
Figures from the UK coronavirus daily dashboard show 11 people died from coronavirus across County Durham, Darlington and North Yorkshire on the same day last year.
Read more: Timeline of alleged Covid rule-breaking Downing Street parties
The continuously rising number of deaths had, sadly, became a part of daily reality during the pandemic and local case numbers also continued to increase at rapid rates.
And 230 Covid-19 patients were admitted to hospitals across the North East and Yorkshire on December 18 – among over 1,600 throughout England.
Local case figures show there were more than 300 cases in the region announced each day.
The probe into alleged Covid rule-busting parties in Government has been widened to include another festive celebration and a reported staff leaving do.
Cabinet Secretary Simon Case will, as well as investigating reports of a staff Christmas bash, also look into two other alleged events.
He will include in his review a confirmed gathering at the Department for Education’s Whitehall headquarters on December 10 last year, and a reported leaving event for a No 10 aide – allegedly attended by Boris Johnson – on November 27.
The two December dates coincide with when mixing between households in London was restricted, with England in a month-long lockdown during November.
In the North East, those caught mixing with other households or people not in their ‘Covid bubble’ were handed hefty fines.
Read more: Every care home in Durham, Darlington, Teesside that reported a Covid death
Statistics published by the National Police Chiefs’ Council reveal a total of 37 fixed penalty notices were issued by Durham Police throughout the county for breaches of Covid-19-related laws between November 17 and December 20 last year.
And officers handed out hundreds more fines in the Northumbria and North Yorkshire police regions, with 1,557 and 249 fines issued respectively.
By December 22 – the day the leaked video was apparently filmed – separate figures from the Department of Health and Social Care reveal that more than a quarter of care homes in England were no longer permitting residents to receive visitors as Covid-19 infection levels rose across the country.
In County Durham, 40 care homes had done the same by December 22 – around a third of all those in the area - while 10 care homes in Darlington, around 40 per cent, had followed suit.
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