England's COVID-19 test and trace system begins as adviser row rumbles on

• Britain has the second highest death toll from the virus globally.

Britain’s government faced questions over how closely people would abide by its new COVID-19 test and trace service on Thursday, as a row persisted over the prime minister’s closest adviser taking a long-distance journey during lockdown.

Lawmakers from the governing Conservative Party continue to add their names to those calling for Dominic Cummings to quit, after it was revealed he had travelled 400 km (250 miles) in March with his four-year-old son and his wife, who was sick at the time, to be close to relatives.

The new system, in place in England from Thursday, is seen as crucial to helping ease lockdown measures. Contacts of those who test positive for COVID-19 will be asked to isolate for 14 days, even if they have no symptoms.

Asked why the public should stick to the rules when many believe Cummings did not, health minister Matt Hancock told BBC radio: “The vast majority of people will understand that it is in everybody’s interests that those who are at higher risk follow these ... instructions and it is very, very important that they do.”

“Frankly this is about how as a country we get out of t

The tracing service, which will have a task-force of 40,000 specialists to test those with symptoms and identify their contacts, will initially rely on what the government described as people doing their “civic duty”, but sanctions could be introduced if people did not comply.

Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have similar programmes just about to launch or already running.

Britain, which has the second highest death toll from the virus globally, abandoned a strategy of testing and tracing in March when the virus started spreading exponentially and there was insufficient capacity to test more than a fraction of those with symptoms.

his lockdown in the safest possible way short of having a vaccine or an effective treatment.”

He also said employers should pay the wages of anyone told to stay at home and isolate by the service as this was equivalent in employment law to being off sick.