Peterborough MP signs pledge campaign against vaccine passports

The passport would see venues allowed to only serve residents who have had the vaccine - with a form of pass required to prove they have had the jab.

But more than 70 MPs from across the political spectrum have now signed a pledge to protest against the plans - with Mr Bristow one of the members.

Signatories include former Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, Labour MPs Dawn Butler and Rebecca Long Bailey, former director of Liberty, Baroness Shami Chakrabarti, and over 40 MPs from the Conservative Covid Recovery Group.

They have been supported by campaign groups Big Brother Watch, Liberty, the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JCWI) and Privacy International.

The pledge states: “We oppose the divisive and discriminatory use of COVID status certification to deny individuals access to general services, businesses or jobs.”

Baroness Chakrabarti said: “International travel is a luxury but participating in your own community is a fundamental right. So internal Covid passports are an authoritarian step too far. We don’t defeat the virus with discrimination and oppression but with education, vaccination and mutual support.”

Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Ed Davey MP said: “As we start to get this virus properly under control we should start getting our freedoms back, vaccine passports - essentially Covid ID cards - take us in the other direction.

“Liberal Democrats have always been the party for civil liberties, we were against ID cards when Blair tried to introduce them and we are against them now.

“I’m pleased Big Brother Watch is helping drive forward a growing consensus against Covid ID cards in our politics. Now I hope we can start to turn the tide on the creeping authoritarianism we are seeing from Number 10 across a broad range of issues.”

Sir Graham Brady MP added: “Covid-Status Certification would be divisive and discriminatory. With high levels of vaccination protecting the vulnerable and making transmission less likely, we should aim to return to normal life, not to put permanent restrictions in place.”

Silkie Carlo, director of Big Brother Watch said: “Our common goal is to emerge from lockdown - healthy, safe and free. But we won’t arrive at freedom through exclusion. Covid passes would be the first attempt at segregation in Britain for many decades, dividing communities without reducing the risks. We are in real danger of becoming a check-point society where anyone from bouncers to bosses could demand to see our papers. We cannot let this Government create a two-tier nation of division, discrimination and injustice.”

Minnie Rahman, Campaigns Director at JCWI, said: “The Hostile Environment, which is built on identity checks, has already been proven to cause discrimination against migrants and people of colour. On top of this, migrant communities face significant barriers to accessing the vaccine. Any recovery plan which risks increasing racial discrimination and purposefully leaves people behind is doomed to fail.”

Sam Grant, Head of Policy and Campaigns at Liberty, said: “We all want to get out of the pandemic as quickly as possible, but we need to do so in a way that ensures we don’t enter a ‘new normal’ which diminishes the rights and liberties we took for granted before the COVID crisis.

“Any passport system has the potential to create a two-tier society, and risk further marginalising people who are already discriminated against and cut off from vital services. Vaccine passports would allow ID systems by stealth, entrenching inequality and division.

“We need strategies that support and enable people to follow public health guidance, including vaccination, alongside more support for the most marginalised who have suffered the sharp edge of the Government’s focus on criminal justice over public health. We won’t get out of this pandemic by entrenching inequality, but only by protecting everyone.”

MORE: Pub covid passports ‘ridiculous’ and ‘discriminatory’ say Peterborough pub bosses

Full list of signatories:

Labour Party

Diane Abbot MP

Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP

Tahir Ali MP

Rebecca Long Bailey MP

Clive Lewis MP

Beth Winter MP

Rachel Hopkins MP

Apsana Begum MP

Richard Burgon MP

Ian Byrne MP

Dawn Butler MP

Jeremy Corbyn MP

Mary Kelly Foy MP

Ian Lavery MP

Ian Mearns MP

John McDonnell MP

Grahame Morris MP

Kate Osborne MP

Zarah Sultana MP

Claudia Webbe MP

Mick Whitley MP

Nadia Whittome MP

Baroness Chakrabarti

Baroness Bryan of Partick

Lord Woodley

Lord Sikka

Lord Hendy

Liberal Democrats

Ed Davey MP

Layla Moran MP

Munira Wilson MP

Alistair Carmichael MP

Daisy Cooper MP

Wendy Chamberlain MP

Sarah Olney MP

Christine Jardine MP

Jamie Stone MP

Tim Farron MP

Lord Scriven

Lord Strasburger

Lord Tyler

Lord Clement-Jones

Conservative Party

Mark Harper MP

Steve Baker MP

Sir Iain Duncan Smith MP

Harriett Baldwin MP

Esther McVey MP

Adam Afriyie MP

Bob Blackman MP

Sir Graham Brady MP

Nus Ghani MP

Andrew Mitchell MP

Peter Bone MP

Ben Bradley MP

Andrew Bridgen MP

Paul Bristow MP

Philip Davies MP

Richard Drax MP

Jonathan Djanogly MP

Chris Green MP

Philip Hollobone MP

Adam Holloway MP

David Jones MP

Simon Jupp MP

Andrew Lewer MBE MP

Julian Lewis MP

Karl McCartney MP

Craig Mackinlay MP

Anthony Mangnall MP

Stephen McPartland MP

Anne Marie Morris MP

Sir John Redwood MP

Andrew Rosindell MP

Greg Smith MP

Henry Smith MP

Julian Sturdy MP

Sir Desmond Swayne MP

Sir Robert Syms MP

Craig Tracey MP

Jamie Wallis MP

David Warburton MP

William Wragg MP

Sir Charles Walker MP

NGOs/Businesses

Big Brother Watch

Liberty

Migrants Organise

Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants

medConfidential

Privacy International