Why do we all need to know now though?
I am no fan of Mr Johnson but I agree that had he just sidled back to work without showing his face then he would have been pilloried for that, so in many ways he couldn’t win whatever if he did. The fact that he’s appeared in typical ‘Boris’ fashion, and told us nothing we don’t already know shouldn’t be a surprise. He’s got nothing to tell.
The general situation may well be improving slowly, but I don’t think I’m alone in doubting a lot of what we have been told and the excuses we are being peddled for data not being available, PPE being in short supply etc etc. I would have far more respect for the politicians if they simply held their hands up and apologised instead of spinning us all some convoluted tale. I can’t get my head around the fact that they managed to get manpower together to build new hospitals, yet couldn’t do the same to collect data from Nursing Homes etc. Call me a cynic but it simply wasn’t in their interest to do this.
I can’t have been the only one who read somewhere (and it wasn’t the Mail, because I don’t read it) that one particular government adviser (and friend of Mr Johnson) had put forward the proposition that as the elderly were nearing the end of their lives resources needed to deal with the pandemic could not be wasted on them. Although unpalatable, the logic in this is perhaps understandable, and to me I think this is why this particular sector was initially left to sink or swim and resources were put in to the NHS. Hence the government’s unwillingness to publicise the number of deaths taking place in community - it would have reflected very badly on it’s handling of the situation.
I get the impression that the country’s initial willingness to comply with lockdown took the government by surprise and that whilst the building of the new hospitals was an amazing feat, in truth unless the pandemic worsens in the future it has been a colossal waste of money that could have been better used to make the situation safer for the staff and residents being cared for in nursing and residential homes and in the wider community. Yes you can argue that the government made the decisions it did in good faith and no doubt based on the science, and that with the benefit of hindsight a lot of us would do things differently, but to my way of thinking they could and definitely should have got their act together more quickly.
Another Issue I have is that in every press briefing, praise is heeped on the public for its compliance with lockdown. This was fine in the early weeks, but now when people are demanding a timetable for ending lock down surely the time has come for the government to call out those that are taking no notice and spell out in words of one syllable the consequences of non compliance. Surely all those who are complying don’t need their egos massaged in this way every day.
Not sure what I’m saying here - just a random collection of thoughts really. I’m not too bothered at the minute about how we will be coming out of lockdown. At the end of the day unless we are prepared to flout the rules we’ll all have no choice but just to go with the flow.