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The Chancellor has ruled out a return of the furlough scheme - and said the coronavirus vaccine rollout was the best protection against imposing new lockdown restrictions.

Speaking on the Sunday morning media round ahead of announcing his Autumn Budget on Wednesday, Mr Sunak said a return of the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme was “not on the cards”, adding the vaccine rollout was the “best line of defence against having to move to put in place any restrictions”.

He told BBC One’s The Andrew Marr Show: “That’s not on the cards because we don’t envisage having to impose significant economic restrictions in the way that we had to over the last year, and the reason for that is, although we’ve always said the winter was going to be challenging, the big change is the vaccine rollout which is our first line of defence and the best way to protect us through the winter is to get the booster campaign, making sure that that’s firing on all cylinders, everyone gets their booster jab when they’re asked.

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“That’s the best line of defence against having to move to put in place any restrictions.”

Rishi Sunak also said the Budget will be “about looking to the future and building a stronger economy for the British people”.

He told the Andrew Marr Show: “That means strong investment in public services, driving economic growth by investing in infrastructure, innovation and skills, giving businesses confidence, and then supporting working families.