EXPECTATIONS are growing that the UK Government will announce a speeding up of the reopening of the hospitality sector south of the Border as Boris Johnson attempts to avoid it suffering mass job losses over the normally lucrative summer period.

A reopening of pubs, restaurants and cafes for outdoor customers across England had been pencilled in from July 4 at the earliest but Government sources have suggested this could now be fast-forwarded to June 22 or even next week when non-essential shops are due to resume business. A “pubs taskforce” has been established to examine ways of fast-tracking a reopening. However, one key problem to the full reopening of the hospitality sector has been the maintenance of the two-metre rule; a majority of the Cabinet is now said to want this lowered to one metre but at present the Government is abiding by the earlier medical and scientific advice on social distancing.

Nicola Sturgeon has expressed optimism that Scotland can lift more lockdown restrictions next week too. Phase 2 of the Scottish Government’s strategy could see the re-opening of beer gardens and outdoor restaurants subject to social distancing.

Alok Sharma, the UK Government’s Business Secretary, will lead today’s daily Downing St briefing. When asked about the reopening of the High St, the Prime Minister's spokesman said: "The Business Secretary is at the press conference later on. I don't want to pre-empt what he might have to say."

Last week, Mr Sharma warned Mr Johnson that up to 3.5 million jobs in the hospitality sector would be at risk without urgent action; the PM in his response is reported to have exclaimed: “Christ!”

The Business Secretary along with Rishi Sunak, the Chancellor, and Robert Jenrick, the Housing Secretary, are said to be among the so-called “save summer six,” who want a faster reopening of the economy.

Mr Jenrick is believed to be considering ways to relax planning controls in England to allow the fuller use of outside space by pubs, bars, cafes and restaurants.

Downing St revealed that ahead of today’s Cabinet, a political Cabinet took place, and the only three ministers physically present in the room were the PM, Mr Sunak and Mr Jenrick.

Senior ministers discussed the “next steps” in the coronavirus recovery roadmap and received updates from Professor Chris Whitty, the Government’s Chief Medical Officer, and Sir Patrick Valance, its Chief Scientific Adviser, who underlined the R rate of infection remained between 0.7 and 0.9 across all parts of the UK.

Mr Johnson’s spokesman told a daily No 10 press briefing: “The PM said the important steps which have been taken so far in easing social distancing and allowing some parts of the economy to reopen have been made possible by the sacrifices of the whole population as we have continued to get the spread of the virus under control.”

He went on: “They spoke about non-essential retail and the Business Secretary is talking at the press conference later on, so nothing further to add on that at the moment.”

The spokesman pointed to the roadmap ambition to reopen pubs, restaurants and cafes as soon as possible and the date in the roadmap was from July 4 but this was subject to medical advice at the time.

When asked about concerns the Government was moving too quickly, he added: “We have been moving forward in a very cautious way. We were always clear that reopening non-essential retail would be conditional on us continuing to meet the five tests, so the way we have preceded is cautiously and we have been clear we are not going to take measures that would risk a second spike in the infections that might overwhelm the NHS.”