Life after lockdown: business hopes and fears
“At a time when the Government is refusing to lay out its plans to end the lockdown”, the private sector “offers a glimpse of how the economy might begin to open up”, said The Economist. Builders, manufacturers, retailers and fast-food joints are at the vanguard of those resuming operations – albeit on a limited scale. Burger King is reopening, some 15 KFCs are back in business, and the sandwich and salad chain Pret a Manger was last week “prêt à ouvrir” ten of its 400 branches.
No one is downplaying the challenges of negotiating a completely changed landscape.
Indeed, the debate currently splitting the
Cabinet is being re-run in boardrooms across many sectors, said Joanna Bourke in the London Evening Standard. Although some construction companies and factories “appear keen to get back up and running”, consumer-facing companies are “severely concerned” that jumping the gun could inflict “greater long-term damage” to businesses. Some report being “paralysed with fear over what the next phase will bring”, said The Sunday Telegraph: could they lose money “at a faster rate” than during lockdown?
“Critics will rightly question how urgently Britain needs more gas-guzzling Aston Martin cars on the roads, or another street lined with cheap, Taylor Wimpey cardboard cut-out homes when the pandemic is still raging,” said Ben Marlow in The Daily Telegraph. But the “bigger question” is whether “a chain reaction” encourages “a flood of reopenings” without the proper safeguards, “which could trigger a dreaded second wave of cases”. The longer the economy is in deep-freeze, the greater the damage and the longer the recovery. But unless the Government clarifies the new rules speedily, it risks “losing control of the lockdown” – and that could be “catastrophic”.