The country needs answers not more vague plans for ‘living’ with Covid

TEN years ago this week – his party having just decimated Fianna Fáil in the first post- crash General Election – Fine Gael leader and soon to be Taoiseach Enda Kenny delivered one of the most memorable lines of his career. With votes still being counted, Mr Kenny told RTÉ viewers that the new Government would be an open book and nothing about the perilous state of the economy would be hidden from the people. “Paddy likes to know what the story is,” he said.

A decade on, Ireland finds itself in the midst of a very different and even deeper crisis but one thing is the same. ‘Paddy’ still wants to know what’s going on.

The government, however, isn’t quite as keen on talking and given the events of recent months it’s easy to see why.

Opening most of the country in the run up to Christmas proved to be a disastrous mistake – though to be fair, thanks to Covid’s UK strain, not entirely one of the government’s making – and ever since Micheál Martin and his cabinet have been playing their cards very close to their chest.

Extreme caution is the watchword and after a seemingly endless stream of avoidable PR gaffes, the government appears to be going with the “if you have nothing nice to say, don’t say anything at all” approach to communications.

While that’s relatively understandable, in the circumstances, it is providing very little reassurance to ‘ Paddy’ and ‘Patricia’ on the street who want – and deserve – to know what’s going on more than ever before.

We are now almost two months into the latest severe lock-down and with no end in sight people are beginning to feel very tired and, throughout the crisis, national morale has never been lower.

While the beginning of the crisis a year ago was marked by a tremendous sense of community and togetherness in the face of an unprecedented crisis, this time there is only malaise.

The start of the vaccination programme had offered a glimmer of hope and while it is going as smoothly as it can – given the major supply issues – its slower than expected progress has severely dented the public’s confidence.

When the new lock-down was announced in December, it was greeted with resigned acceptance. Most people understood the need to shut the country down again but they also expected that the worst of the crisis would have passed by the end of February.

“Sure, what’s there to do in January and February anyway?” was Paddy’s generally philosophical response.

With strict lock-down rules now expected to last well into the summer, and possibly even longer, a wave of despondency has washed over the entire country and the government needs to do something about it.

Mixed messages from ministers won’t cut it anymore and the country needs more than another Living with Covid ‘plan’ that will probably be ripped up within days, like all others.

The public needs straight answers on case and diagnosis targets and a proper time-line for what will happen when they are met. Anything else is just meaningless window dressing.

We want to know what the story is.