The chairman of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservative Party said on Friday the country had appropriate support in place for those businesses being hit by a wave of infections from the Omicron coronavirus variant.

"We have already put support in place, of course we watch this hour by hour, day by day, and I know the chancellor is very closely engaged but at the moment we have appropriate support in place," Oliver Dowden told Sky News.

Businesses in the hospitality sector have been urging the government to provide more financial support after customers cancelled bookings in the crucial Christmas period due to record daily COVID-19 infections.

(Reporting by Elizabeth Piper; writing by Kate Holton; editing by Michael Holden)