Covid: Boxing Day sales off in Wales ahead of lockdown on 28 December

Non-essential shops in Wales will close from the end of trading on Christmas Eve, with an alert level four lockdown starting four days later.

Close-contact services, such as hair salons, will also have to shut before Christmas, First Minister Mark Drakeford has announced.

All pubs, cafes and restaurants will close at 18:00 GMT on Christmas Day.

Meanwhile Mr Drakeford said only two households can meet during the festive period.

It comes despite a previous agreement between the UK nations to stick to plans to allow three households to mix between 23 and 27 December.

Now in Wales the number will be reduced to two households - plus an additional single person who lives alone - and this will become law. The other nations will stick to the three households rule.

The UK leaders had come under pressure to revise the plans amid rising cases.

The situation in Wales was "extremely serious", Mr Drakeford said, with one in five Covid-19 tests returning a positive result.

More than 2,100 people, "equivalent to five full general hospitals" were being treated in the NHS with Covid, he said.

Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price said there was a "very strong case" for going into lockdown now, while Paul Davies, of the Welsh Conservatives, said "doing nothing is not an option".

Wales will go into a level four lockdown, the highest possible, from 28 December, with some sectors closing during the Christmas period.

Under the recently-published plans people will be expected to stay at home, with travel only allowed for essential reasons.

From 28 December, public facilities and holiday accommodation must be shut, and wedding receptions and wakes will need to be called off.

Pubs and restaurants had already been told not to sell alcohol earlier in December, and outdoor and indoor attractions - such as cinemas - are closed now.

But schools and higher education establishments will remain open.

The lockdown has no end date and will be reviewed every three weeks, beginning in January.

As well as non-essential retail, leisure and fitness centres will have to shut after Christmas Eve.

Lucy Evans, co-owner of Me & Luce boutique in Carmarthen, said her family-run business is "at a standstill" with the news of the lockdown as she tries to navigate Christmas and stock levels under the new rules.

"We've had such a difficult year already. Obviously it is understandable that people's health and welfare comes first and I completely agree with that," she said.

"But in terms of business it is devastating."

Economy Minister Ken Skates said there would be an announcement later this week about a "significant sum of money" to provide more support for businesses, including the retail sector, affected by the further restrictions.

"But equally, we're asking businesses, we're asking citizens to put off some of the activities that they would normally undertake just after Christmas until, hopefully, later in January or perhaps a little later after that depending on the three-week review," he told BBC News.

"We do not underestimate the terrible strain that businesses are facing right now."

Mr Drakeford defended allowing hospitality businesses to stay open until 18:00 on Christmas Day.

"We are anxious not to face that industry with additional difficulties at this point," he said.

"We know that many people who live alone arrange their Christmas by booking a meal on Christmas Day, so that they can be in the company of other people.

"I wanted to be able to honour that so that those people do not face an even bleaker Christmas, even more alone and they otherwise would be with all the other harms that come from that."

Nine council areas have more than 20% of tests coming back positive in the last week.

The World Health Organisation has recommended this should be below 5% for places to come out of restrictions.

NHS Wales has again reported record numbers of patients with Covid-19 in hospital beds.

This amounted to 2,143 on Tuesday, 17% more than a week before, and included 614 patients still recovering from the virus but not well enough to be discharged.

Under-pressure hospitals in the Aneurin Bevan health board have the most Covid patients - 620, which is 45% of all patients in its beds.

Numbers of Covid patients in critical care across Wales are also at their highest since the end of April.

Meanwhile, the latest R-number - the rate at which the virus is estimated to be transmitting - is estimated to have increased to a range between 0.9 and 1.2 in Wales. Anything above 1 indicates Covid is increasing.

The Sage scientific body estimates the virus could be shrinking or growing by between -1% and 4% a day in Wales.

Later Mr Drakeford told the Senedd that despite the fact there is variation of coronavirus in parts of Wales, the whole country will be subjected to the highest restrictions.

"Coronavirus is rising in every part of our country and we have an obligation to take the action which will protect all parts of our country".

"If some parts of Wales demonstrate in a reliable and sustainable way that they are in a different part of the spectrum to other parts of Wales, well that can be recognised but we are not in that position today", he said.

Plaid Cymru's Adam Price told a BBC Wales Live debate: "If you follow the logic of the government's own scientific advice, if you're in an emergency situation where you have to pull the emergency cord, if you like, then you're better off doing that earlier.

"Because if you do that earlier that means that the period of lockdown is shorter, so all the other harms are reduced because you intervene earlier and it has greater impact."

Paul Davies, Welsh Conservatives leader in the Welsh Parliament, called for greater clarity regarding Christmas arrangements and urged minsters to keep the situation under review "in order that the restrictions can be lifted as soon as it is safe to do so, including on a regional and local basis where possible."

"We now need a fire blanket, not a firebreak, to put out the flames of infection that are raging in some parts of the country," he added.

"While nobody wants to see further restrictions imposed, in the face of some of the highest rates of coronavirus infection in Western Europe and with rates rising in all parts of Wales, doing nothing is not an option."