‘But never forget that people may also die if we continue the lockdown longer than necessary.

Bill Carmichael

ONE OF the most depressing aspects of the current lockdown is the way the political debate has quickly followed a familiar partisan and factional path.

Far from everyone coming together to fight the unprecedented threat of the pandemic, many people have chosen to snipe from the sidelines and criticise not just the politicians – they are fair game, in my opinion – but also the scientists and medical professionals who seem to me to be doing their very best in desperately difficult circumstances.

There are leagues of amateur virologists and epidemiologists who are quick to point out the mistakes that have been made and claim it could have all been foreseen weeks ago and could have been avoided. Sadly not one of these soothsayers saw fit to give us the benefit of their predictions before the disease took hold, when it might have actually done some good. To a man and woman they are incredibly wise – but only way after the actual event, which renders their boasting completely useless.

The lip-smacking relish with which the daily death toll has been greeted in some quarters is nothing less than stomach churning. I had hoped that we’d see a short respite from the political pointscoring, but no such luck.

Instead, every personal tragedy of an individual death is used as a political cudgel to progress their political viewpoint. There are even Continuity Remainers, who are still fighting the battle they lost so emphatically four years ago, who see Covid-19 as a hell-sent opportunity to thwart Brexit.

Let’s make a few things clear. Firstly, nobody saw this coming – absolutely no one, because if they did you can be sure they would crowing about it now, and nobody is.

Secondly, nobody has had any experience of dealing with a pandemic on this scale – not the politicians and not the scientists whose advice they are following.

No doubt mistakes have been made on testing, protective equipment and advice given to care homes, and once the dust has settled valuable lessons should be learned, because I suspect this is not the end of the coronavirus threat in coming years.

But to suggest the politicians, scientists and doctors were acting in bad faith – or even part of a sinister conspiracy to cull the elderly and vulnerable – is infantile and stupid.

The same goes for the debate into how to ease the lockdown. To those who see the world in simplistic black and white terms you are in one of two camps. Either you are an evil capitalist, with pound signs in your eyes, who wants to drive people back to work in the pursuit of profit and are happy to see tens of thousands die as a result.

Or you are a caring, compassionate type prepared to see the lockdown last for ever because if it “saves one life” it will be worth it.

This is also stupid. Chancellor and Yorkshire MP Rishi Sunak made clear this week that the UK economy is now in desperate trouble, with output virtually frozen and economic growth going into freefall. He suggested GDP could drop by as much as 30 per cent – a figure completely unprecedented in recent history.

And here is an important point. Covid-19 is a deadly killer, but poverty kills also. And the simple fact is that an economic catastrophe on the scale outlined by the Chancellor is likely to kill far more people, particularly the elderly and vulnerable, than coronavirus ever could.

If businesses go bust and people are thrown out of work, there won’t be the taxes paid to the Government to pay for healthcare, education, benefits and the protection of the vulnerable.

That’s why we need to get the economy moving again by lifting the restrictions. Yes, it is a big risk and it needs to be carefully monitored and the restrictions re-imposed if the infection rate begins to rise.

And yes, the brutal truth is that some people may die as a result – but never forget that people may also die if we continue the lockdown longer than necessary.

Politicians have to listen to the best available device and make incredibly difficult choices. With the benefit of that wonderful thing called hindsight we will find out in due course that some of those decisions were wrong. But for me, at the moment, the most compassionate choice is easing the lockdown and getting the economy growing again.