Workers aren’t shirkers

David Patterson, Wiveliscombe, Somerset

It looks as though Sir Graham Brady, chair of the 1922 Committee, has let slip the narrative that this Government is going to push to divert attention from its costly mishandling of the coronavirus crisis.

Presumably he read the podium exhortation to “stay home, protect the NHS, save

lives”. Presumably he heard his colleagues repeat this countless times, yet in the House of Commons on Monday, he said that “in some instances, it may be that the public have been a little bit too willing to stay at home”.

The public stayed home, as directed, as a public service. Those deemed essential risked their lives when they left their homes to try to keep the rest of us safe. Many minimumwaged essential workers have borne the brunt of austerity since the Government bailed out the bankers.

Now it looks as though the new narrative is going to be that these shirkers who were “too willing to stay at home” have bankrupted the economy, so it is perfectly reasonable that they pay for it with another ten years of disparate austerity.

Please don’t fall for it.

boat in the Bay of Arcachon with my exchange friend and his father and uncle, when the father asked me out of the blue, “

Pourquoi vous avez brûlé Jeanne d’Arc?”

I have never forgotten that question. Decades later, again in France, I went to Mass on St Joan’s feast day. As I was leaving, the priest asked me how we celebrated her feast in England. These two unrelated events, separated by 50 years, convince me that the admission of English culpability suggested by Mr Macintyre would be much appreciated and highly beneficial.