National Post (National Edition)
No lockdown exit plan until Johnson returns: ministers
UNITED KINGDOM
Ministers in the U.K. have admitted they do not have an agreed strategy for ending the coronavirus lockdown as they wait for Boris Johnson to return to work and take charge of the policy.
Government sources have told The Daily Telegraph that the exit strategy is still at the “modelling” stage and there is not a document “sitting on a shelf” waiting to be put into action. One insider said there was “no exit plan at the moment because ... there can be no exit strategy until Boris is back in business.”
Grant Shapps, the Transport Secretary, said scientists would review the evidence at the end of the month, meaning it will be a fortnight before there is “clarity” on the way forward.
Alok Sharma, the Business Secretary, warned the public to get used to a “new normal” for the foreseeable future because Britain would not go back to “the way we were” even when restrictions begin to be eased.
It came as Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s First Minister, said it was time to treat the public like “grown ups” by keeping them informed of the latest thinking on the strategy.
The U.K. death toll has risen to 14,576 following the announcement of 847 deaths yesterday. Sir Patrick Vallance, the chief scientific adviser, said he expected deaths to “continue at a plateau for a little while, and then to come down slowly after that.”
While Dominic Raab, who is standing in for Johnson, has set out five tests that must be met before any of the restrictions can be lifted, there is no agreement about how a gradual easing of the lockdown would happen.
One Cabinet minister said: “The real decisions are being made in No. 10 — and that’s where it gets so difficult in the absence of the Prime Minister, because who has the authority to make those decisions? The truth is they can’t be made until he comes back.”
The minister said Raab’s five-point plan “basically allows the Government to do what it wants to do when it wants to do it — to only announce an exit strategy when we are ready”.
The Prime Minister’s spokesman said it was “just wrong” to suggest that the Cabinet was delaying decisions on the lockdown until Johnson returned to work, insisting that “work is taking place across Whitehall” to decide what to do next.
Johnson spoke to Raab on Thursday but is not doing any Government work and is “focused on his recovery,” Downing Street said.
Another Cabinet source said: “We don’t have a strategy sitting on the shelf, we need to have a lot of internal discussions first. A lot of it will have to come from the scientists. The plan will be affected by what happens in the coming weeks in countries that are lifting lockdown measures.” A third Cabinet source said: “There’s no exit plan at the moment because they don’t want to do anything without the boss’s say so.
“Not a huge amount is going on in these Cabinet meetings.”
The source added: “They are waiting for the public to change their minds.
“We didn’t want to go down this route in the first place — public and media pressure pushed the lockdown, we went with the science.
“The lockdown will only start coming loose when the public wants it to — not ministers.”
Advice given to the Cabinet by the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) would be pivotal, according to another Cabinet insider, who said this was expected at the end of the month. “The belief is that the key decisions on any exit strategy will be taken by the PM, his No. 10 team and SAGE,” the source added.
Shapps hinted at the current impasse by saying there would be “a review by the scientists at the end of this month ... We’ll be in a position to provide greater clarity.”
Sturgeon said she would set out over the next week how the Scottish government would ease the restrictions, “so that we are treating the public like the grown-ups that they are.”
Asked if the Government was treating the public like children, a Downing Street spokesman said: “We have set out our five tests but we are at a critical point and we want people to remain focused on that core message of the need to stay at home.”
THE REAL DECISIONS ARE BEING MADE IN NO. 10 — AND THAT’S WHERE IT GETS SO DIFFICULT IN THE ABSENCE OF THE PRIME MINISTER, BECAUSE WHO HAS THE AUTHORITY TO MAKE THOSE DECISIONS? THE TRUTH IS THEY CAN’T BE MADE UNTIL HE COMES BACK. — A U.K. CABINET MINISTER