Vaccine success should herald our lockdown exit
AT LAST there’s light at the end of the tunnel. Brynglas tunnels that is!
From the moment that pessimistic man called Mark Drakeford came in the position of First Minister he’s been an unmitigated disaster.
When he first came into power despite more than £100m of public money being spent on the feasibility of a M4 relief road which categorically came to the conclusion of going ahead with the scheme, Drakeford defied economic and common sense and abandoned the scheme almost single handedly.
That was just the beginning of his disastrous reign. He just couldn’t wait to wield his power right from the beginning of the pandemic, with his obvious “just to be different” policy and his hatred for the UK Government and in particular his contempt of our Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
This contempt was clearly visible in the recent snippets of film in the S4C “fly on the wall documentary” when he said on a number of times how awful the Prime Minister was.
Even if he thought it why did he show his contempt in front of a film crew, which incidentally appeared to be present on his shoulder during a Cobra Zoom meeting?
Another revealing feature during that documentary was despite advice from other ministers to extend the firebreak in November it appeared to be his decision to keep it limited to an inadequate 17 days.
Not only that but he allowed unlimited travel in Wales and crucially allowed four separate households to meet. Of course we now know this decision was catastrophic as the infection rate rose to some of the worst rates in the world. The Kent strain at this time was not a significant fact as he often implies. Drakeford brags it was the Welsh Government’s decision to act first to start the latest lockdown in the UK but the truth is that by the middle of December and coupled with the added Kent strain now having some effect it left them panicking and leaving them with no alternative but to impose the inevitable lockdown. The decision not to extend the firebreak in November has been a huge mistake and has cost thousands of lives. When that firebreak ended there were 190 per 100,000 infections in Wales. Now the infection rates are at least five times lower and still we in Wales have no roadmap. Unbelievable!
To me it’s obvious that the Welsh Government because they made that huge mistake are paranoid to open the floodgates again. This is despite the fact the most vulnerable categories have been vaccinated and now have a little or no chance of dying or being hospitalised if they were unfortunate enough to contract the coronavirus.
I don’t know about you, I’ve personally had enough and want to start living again.
Paul Fenton
Penarth
Now the infection rates are at least five times lower and still we in Wales have no roadmap
Paul Fenton Penarth