Blame for crisis lies at door of Number10

THIS Prime Minister is on record as once saying he was a “wise man playing the fool to win”. All the evidence thus far of his service in his present job suggests he is, in fact, the other way around, he is out of his admitted character... he is a fool playing a wise man with the rather obvious result for us. He is a man of low intellectual stamina with a rather short vision on consequences and has a parrot-like application of reasoning.

It’s as though whatever he does he sees he will win – even by losing. He talks to the heads of the biggest economic nations on the planet and tells them they must learn not to repeat the previous pandemic mistakes as though he has not made any. One gets the feeling that if Britain made mistakes it was us that made them – not him.

He stands rather sheepishly at his emperor’s podium and recites what has been written for him by his group of wordsmiths in No 10 Public Relations department while he is propped up by a couple of academics who actually know and understand something about the progress of infection and the numbers game of statistical data and how moving data works.

He announces the extension of unlock date the day after the other presidents and PMs all went home in what must be a state of exasperation. Johnson knew probably a week ago the experts were saying delay, delay – but he wanted his moment in history as king of the G7 castle. Hands up all reporters who knew June 21st was not opening time bar a few ifs and buts.

He just wiped out the hospitality industry’s hopes for a good season of profits to make up for earlier losses.

British mistakes with the coronavirus started with day one in January 2020.

Johnson saw it as his Trafalgar, Waterloo and the Second World

War rolled into one. He would be St George. This should have been an alliance of Parliaments best people, a national government attacking a national crisis. But no, soon we were all into briefings; how much they were spending of our money, set piece presentations of earnest politicians making profound announcements obsessed with numbers.

Good numbers and disappointing numbers ; 25,000 casualties would be heavy but if we could control the spread might yes see this as the battle for Britain, as slowly in the tables for best for, first for, we were last; last and last and the numbers game of 25,000 deaths became 160,000 and we quickly stopped talking about how they added up. Thank goodness we had the nation’s heroes in the NHS. And the mass of people who quietly came forward and vaccinated us.

And why do we have a third wave? Because Mr Johnson delayed the red line on people from India and he refuses to tell us the reasons why and 35,000 people a week are found to have been infected by this new Indian strain and he still refuses to say who is to blame, because it’s him, a self obsessed man playing the fool to lose.

Don Frampton by email