Opinion: Vaccine Passports Should not Become Another 'New Normal'
Scotland will enter a new phase of the coronavirus pandemic with the introduction of vaccine passports for entry to nightclubs, gigs and football matches from the beginning of October. Are they a necessary measure ahead of what’s expected to be a ‘remarkably hard’ winter for the NHS, or setting the country on a “disturbing and illiberal course”?
Alex Cole-Hamilton, who succeeded Willie Rennie as leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats, believes it’s the latter, an unacceptable overreach of the state into the private medical data of its citizens. The Scottish government maintain that they are a necessary measure amid high numbers of Covid-19 cases, a “targeted and proportionate means” aimed at avoiding another national lockdown, and to encourage those still to be vaccinated to take up the offer of a vaccine.
It quickly became an over-used cliché to say that we have been living in ‘unprecedented’ times, though there is no doubt that the last eighteen months have – to unfortunately use another cliché – seen the emergence of a ‘new normal’, with simple public health measures such as the wearing of face masks on public transport becoming…well…normal.
However, the introduction of vaccine passports represents something quite different. For the first time, people will be expected to produce evidence (QR codes on smartphones or a paper certificate) that they have had two doses of a vaccine to visit a nightclub, go to a gig, or attend a football game.
There’s no getting away from the fact that this is, by its very nature, a fundamentally illiberal mandate in that it legally imposes restrictions that did not previously exist. People who don’t own smartphones and want to participate in these activities will have to obtain a paper copy – fine if you’re computer literate and able to quickly access the internet to request or print one out, not so much if you don’t have a computer & printer, and your local library remains closed.
There is also a sense that the government has got things backward, in that the Covid horse had already bolted once the doors of nightclubs were finally reopened over the summer. Would it not have made more sense to get the vaccine passport infrastructure in place before the summer reopening, especially now that people have had almost two months of (relatively) restriction-lite revelry?
Indeed, the Night Time Industries Association Scotland (NTIA) has launched a legal challenge against the plans, saying that they are “deeply flawed and incoherent.” It could also be argued that the plans disproportionately target the younger population, pre-emptively laying the blame on them for any possible surge in cases and deaths, despite Nicola Sturgeon pointing out that the highest increase in vaccine uptake over September has been among the 20-24 year old age group.
The government itself has already said that in contrast to nightclubs, it will not be mandatory for football clubs to check the vaccine status of everyone entering a stadium, seemingly a concession to the unfeasibility of checking 50,000 spectators at Celtic Park or Ibrox. Given that we know that it only takes one person to spread Covid, surely this defeats the point of the vaccine passport.
Jackie Ballie, deputy leader of the Scottish Labour party, voted against the measure, arguing that vaccine passports have only been brought in “so that the government could give the appearance of doing something, even though it may be the wrong thing.”
The government would argue that they are doing whatever they can to keep people safe as soceity reopens and that some opposition members are acting in bad faith rather than taking a principled stance on civil liberties. Douglas Ross, leader of the Scottish Conservatives, was accused of hypocrisy by SNP MP Allison Thewlis for appearing content to support similar plans (later scrapped) for vaccine passports put forward by the UK government, while vociferously opposing the Scottish government’s proposal.
And despite what her less restrained critics may believe, the first minister is not a swivel eyed demagogue intent on stripping us of all our liberties; she is a deeply serious politician who has always treated the pandemic with the respect it demands, in stark contrast to her counterpart in Downing Street.
It is also hard to take seriously conservative politicians who disingenuously witter on about mental health as a reason to blithely get rid of all restrictions. Mental health is indeed a serious issue, one that a decade of cuts to services by successive Tory governments has only exacerbated.
That’s not to say concerns about vaccine passports aren’t entirely without merit. The government proposals have no specific threshold stated for when they should end. Much like the announcements about the imposing and lifting of restrictions that we became so familiar with in 2020, the need for vaccine passports will be assessed by ministers every three weeks “until further notice.”
No reasonable person wants the country to get into a situation similar to last winter when UK deaths from Covid reached a tragic peak of 100,000, and only a fool would expect the government not to consider any measure that could help prevent the country reaching another unwanted milestone. However, if the vaccine passports are successful in meeting the government’s stated aims – to drive up vaccination numbers and prevent future lockdowns – they should ultimately only be used as a temporary measure, not become another ‘new normal’.