Boris Johnson says South Yorkshire Tier 3 talks 'ongoing' as measures are forced on Greater Manchester

South Yorkshire leaders continue to discuss the support that would be available should the region move into Tier 3 restrictions, which would mean pubs and bars closed, and mixing between households would be banned indoors and outdoors.

Boris Johnson said: “Discussions continue in South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire, Nottingham and the North East.

"We hope and expect that central and local governments will continue to work closely together with us to help us succeed, as we have seen in Merseyside, Lancashire and London, to protect the NHS and save lives.”

Meanwhile, Greater Manchester has been forced into Tier 3 after talks between Manchester mayor Andy Burnham and Downing Street broke down, with local leaders there refusing to accept the new restrictions unless at least £65m of support was guaranteed.

The Government would reportedly not go higher than its offer of £60m.

At the Downing Street press conference today Boris Johnson announced that Greater Manchester would have Tier 3 restriction imposed on them from midnight on Thursday (October 22), coming into force on Friday.

The Prime Minister also now said that Greater Manchester would only get £22m worth of support in the package that accompanied the new restrictions.

Johnson said: “This evening… I can announce that Greater Manchester will move to the very high alert level.

“That means that pubs and bars must close, unless they are serving substantial meals, households can’t mix in doors, or in most outdoor settings.

“In some public outdoor spaces groups must be limited to the rule of six.

“And, we strongly advise against travel into and out of the area.

“Over the last 10 days we tried to get an approach with local leaders in Greater Manchester. Unfortunately an agreement wasn’t reached and I do regret this.

“I bitterly regret any restrictions that lead to damage to businesses, to people’s lives. Of course I do,” he said.

“What we couldn’t do is do a deal with Greater Manchester that was out of kilter with the agreements we had already reached with Merseyside and with Lancashire.”

Following the breakdown in talks Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham said: “The Government walked away from what we needed to protect people from poverty during what will be a punishing winter.

“That is what we believe we needed to prevent poverty, to prevent hardship, to prevent homelessness. Those were the figures that we had – not what we wanted – but what we needed to prevent all of those things from happening.

“At no point today were we offered enough to protect the poorest people in our communities through the punishing reality of the winter to come.

“Even now, I am still willing to do a deal but it cannot be on the terms that the Government offered today.”