Captain Cautious takes safest route to make unlocking ‘irreversible’

WE could have had a very different speech yesterday from Boris Johnson. We could be unfolding a very different road map to take us out of coronavirus lockdown over the next few weeks.

With more than 17 million of the most vulnerable already vaccinated, the economy on its knees and a sizeable proportion of the population desperate to re-start their old carefree lives, the PM could have played the metaphorical Easter Bunny, aiming most of his unlocking to coincide with, say, Good Friday on April 2 and the start of the holidays.

An earlier version of Boris during this pandemic might have done just that. We saw it in December, when he argued with his more cautious advisers, determined to let us all enjoy Christmas, only partially pulling back on those plans a day or so before the event. We saw it last Spring when – with initiatives like Eat Out To Help Out – Boris and Chancellor Rishi Sunak as good as declared the pandemic all but over.

Yesterday – by contrast – while the situation is far, far better than it ever was in 2020, thanks to effective vaccines and a world-class roll-out, Boris was Captain Cautious. Only schools and an outdoor meeting with a friend permissible by March 8, which is still two weeks away. From then on an almost snail-paced lifting of the restrictions, leaving it until June 21 – the longest day of the year – for full opening up, all being well.

Yet for all the grimaces and headshaking this tortoise-like progress attracted from some on the Conservative back benches and many in the hospitality sector, Boris has made the correct call.

Slow but steady wins the race is not Boris Johnson’s natural approach to politics; but it is the right one in all the circumstances.

It was chief medical officer Sir Patrick Vallance who insisted on a fiveweek gap between each of the unlocking measures, to stress-test them against a new wave of the virus. Old Boris would have been considering how that would play with his right-wing backbenchers and those who fear for the impact on the economy.

New, cautious, Boris has learned that a majority of voters are much more bothered about what it does to case rates, hospitalisations and deaths.

The Prime Minister is no fan of rules restricting individual liberty – and for too long he allowed that distaste for restrictions to dictate policy, perhaps thinking that a majority shared his views. Yet most people are more bothered about staying safe and opening up only when the risk is more manageable. The PM now sees that too. There were some chilling words towards the start of his Commons statement yesterday, to the effect that we will never be entirely free of Covid. We all have to get used to that, and to managing the risk. We cannot stay locked down forever.

But one key word –“irreversible” – stood out from the statement. If that is what this route out of lockdown proves to be, without U-turns or excessive stops, then many of the mistakes clearly made throughout this pandemic will be forgiven. That’s why the best course is playing it safe. Fingers crossed.

CONTRARY to the myth that the South West peninsula is being covered in concrete, I believe there is nothing like enough efficient housing for the many more working people we will need, post-Brexit, to power the farms, factories, fisheries and innovations we are going to need to feed the UK population.

We want housing for rural people, who are generally more self-reliant than city dwellers, who will create the new greener industries of the 21st century as less artificial energy and more manpower is required.

Tony Maskell Newton Ferrers, Devon