In October 2020, Mayor Andy Burnham said during Covid:“People here in Greater Manchester have been living under restrictions for three months, and they have taken a heavy toll on people. They are struggling. To accept any further restrictions in these circumstances would be certain to increase levels of poverty, homelessness, and hardship within our city-region. Let’s be clear who is most affected by a Tier 3 lockdown: it is people working in pubs, in bookies, driving taxis. But this city-region has never walked on by, and it never will.”