Sturgeon: Changing lockdown message could be ‘catastrophic mistake’

‘Nicola Sturgeon has warned it could be “catastrophic” to drop the stay at home message as she announced that the lockdown is to be extended in Scotland.

It has been suggested that Boris Johnson could scrap the slogan as part of moves to ease some lockdown rules.

Ms Sturgeon said the Scottish government may be prepared to allow people to spend more time outdoors.

But she said scrapping the “clear, well understood” stay at home message was “a potentially catastrophic mistake”.

Ms Sturgeon said she would prefer all four nations to make changes together because that would help give consistent messages to the public.

However, she said it was possible to go “different ways” if they were at different stages.

Following a call between Ms Sturgeon and the prime minister, a spokeswoman for Mr Johnson acknowledged that different parts of the UK could “move at slightly different speeds”, with “decisions made based on the science for each nation”.

Both the Scottish and UK governments formally extended their coronavirus lockdown measures on Thursday.

However Mr Johnson – who will make a televised address about the future on Sunday evening – has suggested some measures could start to be lifted from Monday.

Ms Sturgeon said she was open to relaxing the rules around outdoor exercise, but said no other measures should be eased at this “critical juncture”.

Scrapping the “stay at home message” could confuse people, she added.’