Matt Hancock, the health secretary, has hinted that the government will impose tough new hotel quarantine rules for people arriving in the UK. For some days ministers have been discussing plans for people arriving in the UK to be forced to quarantine in hotels, but there has been disagreement about whether the new conditions should just apply to people visiting from countries where the Covid risk is particularly high, or whether they should apply more broadly. Asked if he favoured the hotel quarantine rules applying to all arrivals, Hancock said the “precautionary principle” should apply - implying he favoured stricter rather than looser rules. He said: I think it is incredibly important that we are cautious at the border ... It is important that we protect from new variants should they have vaccine evasion. And it is also reasonable to take a precautionary principle to protect this country whilst we work on the science and the analysis of the different variants that are discovered around the world. Earlier Boris Johnson also hinted that he favoured more comprehensive rather than more limited restrictions, saying the policy should provide “the maximum possible protection against reinfection from abroad”. (See 11.49am.) Ministers are expected to take a decision tomorrow. The UK has recorded the lowest number of new Covid cases for more than a month, although the number of people on mechanical ventilation in hospital with the illness has hit a record high. (See 4.36pm.) Schools in England are not expected to start fully reopening until at least early March, Downing Street has indicated, as Tory MPs and children’s advocates pressurised Boris Johnson to set out a timetable for the process. Workers who are regularly exposed to coronavirus through their job, including care home workers and nurses, are more likely to die from the virus than people in other professions, according to fresh analysis. Brendan Clarke-Smith, a 40-year-old Conservative MP who received the coronavirus vaccine after spending an afternoon volunteering at a local hospital, has said this happened because there were some left-over doses, which would have otherwise gone to waste. The vaccine manufacturer Moderna has started work on a booster for its Covid jab to improve protection against a new variant of coronavirus first detected in South Africa. The Covid vaccine is failing to reach thousands of elderly people who receive care in their own homes, because they are too frail to travel to vaccination centres or fear infection if they do, a care provider has said. The UK is at risk of becoming a failed state and breaking up unless there are deep reforms of the way the country is governed, the former prime minister Gordon Brown has said. Douglas Ross, the Scottish Tory leader, has said his party would boycott a Scottish independence referendum set up without the approval of Westminster. The Labour party’s lawyers have written to the director of public prosecutions alleging that Shaun Bailey, the Conservative party’s candidate for London mayor, used fraud to influence upcoming elections by publishing leaflets headed with fake City Hall insignia. That’s all from me for today. But our coverage continues on our global coronavirus live blog. It’s here.