A FORMER minister has admitted she has kept her parents “literally locked up” all year to stop them adding to the burden on the NHS.
Tory MP Caroline Nokes said she has done shopping and run errands for dad Roy Perry – a former council leader and Euro MP – and mum Veronica since March so they could stay at home.
And she claimed that at one stage she even parked her car across their drive to stop them leaving their house and risk catching Covid.
The ex immigration minister made the extraordinary confession on live TV as she defended the Government’s policy of locking down the country in order to protect the NHS from being overwhelmed by coronavirus sufferers.
She told BBC Two’s Politics Live on Monday: “I’ve kept my parents locked up since March. Literally locked up.
“I’ve done all their shopping for them, I have run every errand and at one point parked my car over their driveway so that they couldn’t get out.
“Because I am absolutely determined that they are not going to increase the burden on our brilliant health service.”
Ms Nokes, MP for Romsey and Southampton North in Hampshire, justified last month’s lockdown and the ongoing tiered system of restrictions by saying: “It absolutely was about making sure the NHS wasn’t overwhelmed, and it was successful in that.
“And it’s more than that because NHS staff, our brilliant frontline workers, have been working incredibly hard over months and months and months – they are exhausted.
“So to take unnecessary risks with the NHS now strikes me as being extremely foolhardy.
“So that’s why I supported the measures last week, I’ve seen my area go into Tier 2 where there are still restrictions on the way people can go about their lives.”
But people on social media were shocked at her claims.
One person said: “What the hell.
“MP admits to parking over her parent’s driveway, so they were literally shut in. I’m almost speechless.”
They added that the Government had this year tried to use “emotional manipulation and threats to control us.”
Another person replied: “Why is this OK?
“Why should your parents have their agency removed like this? Is this what you think society should do to the elderly – lock them away like they’re a nuisance?”
One person said: “Why did you lock up your parents @carolinenokes?”
Ms Nokes, 48, has not previously revealed that she has been looking after her parents all year, although she once hinted at it on Twitter.
In April, she tweeted that supermarket shoppers should be nice to staff “even when you’ve had the trolley with the squeaky wheel that doesn’t go in a straight line and your mother’s shopping list has made no sense”.
HOAR has reached out to Ms Nokes for comment.
Her dad Mr Perry, 77, was a councillor for almost 50 years and was leader of Hampshire County Council until 2019 when he retired.
He also served as an MEP between 1994 and 2002.
Mr Perry and his wife have been married for more than 50 years.
