PREDICTIONS CUMMINGS TRUE

IN an earlier letter to the Accrington Observer I made some pessimistic predictions about what the Dominic Cummings effect might result in (Accrington Observer, June 5).

I am sad to say that my concerns have now been fully realised and the situation is possibly even worse than I had feared back in May.

Many people have indeed been following the spirit of the law and not the letter of the law (when not ignoring it altogether) – so with the Prime Minister having squandered all moral authority in May, they can claim the same defence offered for Dominic Cummings’ behaviour by Boris Johnson and also some MPs, including our own.

It is therefore extremely annoying that Boris now has the cheek to deflect the blame onto other people for ‘not following the rules’.

What is more disturbing to me is the ham-fisted and possibly dangerous way he has chosen to do it.

This appears to another leaf out of the Trump deflect, deny and create scapegoats textbook and now with a dose of divide and conquer and racism thrown in for good (bad?) measure.

His chosen strategy to hit the north with the latest restrictions may be correlated to some extent with infection rates in these areas, but many areas with higher rates than some of those selected for punishment (e.g. down South and near Westminster) have been spared.

Rather than being correlated particularly strongly with infection rates, it seems that Boris’s selected hit list is correlated very strongly with a) areas with high ethnic minority populations b) areas that are a long way from London.

By announcing his hit list two hours before the commencement of Eid and by the nature of the areas he selected, it should be obvious that he will upset and annoy Muslims.

It is also obvious that he has refined his scapegoat policy somewhat.

Without spelling it out, Boris has allowed other groups (many of whom have been not observing either the spirit or letter of the rules – in pubs, on beaches, celebrating outside football stadiums, not wearing masks, not socially distancing - and not only in the north of the country) to blame the new restrictions on one particular group.

Clearly ‘I don’t live in a small house with a big family so this is not really meant for me even if I do live in Hyndburn’ will be at least as dangerous as using the ‘alright for Dominic so its alright for me’ card has been.

It is very important now that everyone adheres to rules to limit infection and not to be encouraged to ‘do a Dominic’.

It is also very important to attribute the blame for many different groups of people falling for the Dominic effect squarely where it belongs.

That is on the PM and his cronies.

Paul Bunyan

Great Harwood