A leading scientist believes a national lockdown now may SAVE Christmas for families.

Professor Calum Semple, a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), told BBC Breakfast that “the tiered approach to restrictions hasn’t worked particularly well”.

When asked what could be achieved with a reported four-week lockdown, Prof Semple said: “If that was applied nationally and was adhered to you would see a dramatic fall in hospital admissions and that’s in four weeks’ time.”

He suggested there should be a review at four weeks and there could be a “bit of easing around the festive activities” but that a lockdown would give officials “time to get test, trace and isolate processes really up to scratch.

“I think the only real way that we have a relatively safe Christmas is to get the incidence right down because otherwise I think Christmas is very difficult for people – nobody wants to have a disrupted Christmas holiday period where you can’t see your family and so on.

“So I think the only way that that can be safely achieved is to bring the incidence right down, and in order to do that we have to take action now and that action needs to be stringent, unfortunately.”