Hope springs eternal – don’t let them down

You could almost feel the collective exhalation of breath as the realisation began to sink in. For the first time in so, so long people and businesses yesterday let, to use a rather old-fashioned term, their stays out and allowed themselves a moment of low-key celebration.

At the end of a winter of discontent like no other, the prime minister’s Monday announcement of a plan to get us out of the other end of that oft-quoted tunnel and emerge blinking and trembling into the new season, literally put a spring in people’s steps.

Much of the relaxation of the Covid rules, regulations and laws, will not happen for months, but it was enough to send legions of hairdressers and barbers scurrying for their appointment books for the first time in months.

At last, cash-strapped businesses across the region can now make tentative plans to reopen, yes, even the nightclubs.

And for a society starved of one of our most important foundations – culture – the news that Wickham Festival is to go ahead in the summer is arguably the brightest announcement for this region so far this year. Surely it can only be a matter of days before the organisers of Victorious Festival reveal their plans and those too running the Isle of Wight Festival.

But we must not get carried away. After all, we’ve been down this road before.

Hopes have been dashed in the cruellest way possible twice before when lockdown was, let’s face it, lifted far too early.

That is why at the slightest hint that the numbers are spiralling out of control again, the reopening of society must be halted – no ifs, no buts.

But, as we report today, our business community really does have a little something to celebrate at the moment.

So, as and when they do get up and running again, we must support them. Don’t let them down.