Covid-19, lockdown – and you: Our survey results

14,000 of you responded to our Great Big Lockdown Survey. Here, David James examines the key findings

THE enormous impact that lockdown is having on all our lives is shown in the results of a survey of more than 14,000 people in Wales.

From increased feelings of anxiety or loneliness, money worries or frustration that social distancing measures were brought in too late to stop the rampant spread of coronavirus causing devastating loss of life in Wales and across the rest of the UK, there are few areas of life that lockdown has not affected.

We ran the Great Big Lockdown Survey on our WalesOnline website for five days from the evening of Thursday, April 30, until the evening of Tuesday, May 5.

It was filled in by 14,302 people on WalesOnline and a total of 402,595 people across all 42 of our sister titles in the Reach plc network of news websites.

In total, more than 1,300 people had died in Wales while suffering from Covid-19 by April 24, according to the most recent figures published by the Office for National Statistics – and the daily death totals published by Public Health Wales suggest the true total has continued to grown since then.

Many of the themes that come out of the survey are shared across the UK.

But there are also some marked differences.

People in Scotland are the most likely to think that social distancing measures should have been brought in sooner.

We have picked out seven key findings from the survey – the results here are drawn from the responses of the 14,302 people who filled in the survey in Wales.

■ Social distancing measures should have been brought in sooner

More than seven out of 10 people (71%) think that the governments in Cardiff Bay and Westminster should have acted sooner to stop the spread of coronavirus.

It was on March 12 that Boris Johnson made his speech in Downing Street warning that many more would die, yet it was not until March 23 that the lockdown restrictions were put into place across the UK.

As the governments here in Wales and in Westminster plot a route out of those restrictions, the powerful message from our readers is that they did not act quickly enough in the first place. Of the remaining readers who filled in the survey, 24% said the social distancing measures were introduced at the right time, 2% said they didn’t know and 2% said they shouldn’t have been introduced at all.

Readers in Scotland (79% in Edinburgh and 77% in Glasgow) were the most likely to think that social distancing measures should have been brought in sooner.

■ We’re resigned to the impact on our lives continuing for many months

As people look ahead to the loosening of lockdown with a mixture of trepidation at the effect it will have on the virus and excitement at the prospect of having more freedom, it is clear most know that the changes will only happen slowly.

In common with people across the UK, some 39% of our readers expect social distancing measures to continue for more than five months, which would take us to the end of September and beyond.

Only 5% think the restrictions will be ended by the end of the month. Some 12% think they will be in place for 1-2 months, 18% for 2-3 months, 14% for 3-4 months, and 11% for 4-5 months.

■ People in Wales rate Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak’s handling of the outbreak more highly than leaders here

If ever a question was going to tease out people’s political attitudes, and the extent to which they’ve suffered from coronavirus, it’s asking them to rate how the government has handled the response to Covid-19.

In Wales, we were asking people to rate the performance of two separate administrations in Cardiff Bay and Westminster who have different powers and responsibilities re lockdown, furlough and our health services.

Here people had little sense that there had been a marked difference between how well the Welsh Government and UK Government had handled the outbreak – rating both administrations 5.5 on a sliding scale where 10 would be the highest score.

The areas of the UK most critical of Boris Johnson’s administration were in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Belfast. People in London, Manchester and Liverpool gave a similar rating of the UK Government to people in Wales, while outside the major cities people had a markedly more favourable view, rating it 6.8 in Devon, 6.5 in Leicestershire, 6.7 in Derbyshire.

Looking at individuals, Chancellor Rishi Sunak received the strongest average score in terms of performance from people in Wales, of 6.4.