On lockdowns

No one wanted a 2nd lockdown, least of all me.

It was inevitable, ever since really August, maybe before that, when the economy and society was being loosened without there really being the evidence that was a good idea. OI remember writing that a few times in late spring/early summer.

And so here we are.

Again.

There should have been a two week lockdown in September. SAGE recommended it, and Johnson refused. But with numbers climbing all the time, and with people being threatened with the sack if they did not go back to work, and universities reopening, I recall, again, how foolish I thought those two things were, to do at the same time.

And here we are.

Again.

A longer, stricter lockdown is needed to break the infection rate, give a chance for ICUs to recover and not be swamped, and there is no plan on how to unlock. There is no plan on how to get testing capacity back again. There is no plan on how to fix track and trace. And no plan to sack those responsible and replace them with folks, experts, who know what they are doing.

It is madness.

And yet here we are again, the Government deciding the lesson it learnt from march in being late in locking down was to do exactly the same thing, thus condemning thousands to an early death, costing the economy double what a two week lockdown in September would have cost.

We are truly lead by idiots.

And yet there are some, many, who think it is the fault of the public, people pushing round internet memes saying how it is the young and the poor who ignore rules and laws. But it is the Government that make these as complicated as possible, I try to understand them, I follow legal bloggers who try to make sense of the Sis and new restrictions, make sense so they can tell us. And it is hard.

Nigel Farrage is reforming the Brexit Party as an anti-lockdown Reform UK party, as he has seen another way to cloud a complicated truth with a simple lie. He was supporting the lockdown last week, this week, it’s a new opportunity.

And the truth is, the middle classes are fine. I am fine. I can work from home, still get paid, get food delivered or stock up, and it be a bit of an inconvenience. While for others, their job has gone, winter is coming, they have to heat their home, feed the family and all the while colossal uncertainty. It must be hell.

And the sad truth is that it is going to get worse, much worse before things ease, with the combination of COVID and Brexit, parts of the country and economy will never recover.

If the chancellor can see how much a lockdown costs, and baulks, why can’t he see the same for Brexit and baulk too?

And finally, those who complain about the lack of freedom to shop and have a pint or seven brought on by the lockdown are mostly those who stood by and cheered as the rest of us lost the right to live and work in 27 countries.