The Government has revealed its rationale for putting York and North Yorkshire into Tier 2.

A statement says the decision was down to the rate of coronavirus among people over the age of 60 and the proportion of tests coming back positive.

But city leaders said York's data has been included with areas that have a much higher infection and positivity rate.

And they have called for the city to be considered separately to North Yorkshire in tier reviews.

City of York Council leader Keith Aspden said: "I think lots of people will be disappointed by going into Tier 2, primarily because our rates have come down thanks to all the hard work from businesses, communities and the public health team.

"Certainly what I will be feeding back to the Government is that we need clarity now, pretty quickly on what the exact criteria are for moving between tiers, how frequently they are going to review it - is it going to be weekly, is it going to be fortnightly?

"And whether moving forward they are going to keep doing it on a subregional basis so that we are put with North Yorkshire, or whether they are going to be doing it on a local authority basis.

"That's going to be pretty crucial because our rates are really low at the moment - Scarborough's, which is a pretty long way away, are high.

"That clarity is going to be crucial to help us give that support to residents and businesses about how it's going to be handled through to the New Year."

York's director of public health Sharon Stoltz added: "When I was looking at the figures that were quoted for North Yorkshire and York what they have done is lumped York in with North Yorkshire - and that has disadvantaged us in York really.

"As Keith has said, our numbers are lower. Our case numbers are lower, our positivity rate is lower.

"I would hope going forward that we'll be able to ask for York as a unitary authority to be considered separately.

"Even though North Yorkshire's case numbers are coming down, they're not coming down as quickly as ours and they started from a higher point.

"People in York understand that this is how it has happened - because Government didn't look at York's data on its own."